The Swedish Scene

                            Nov. 1989   


During the Summer of this year my YL & I decided to spend a couple of weeks in
Sweden and I decided beforehand that I would make an effort to try to explore
the Computing scene and in particular to try to obtain Amiga magazines
(preferably with disks) that were not widely available, if at all, in the U.K.
One thing that was immediately evident was that there was certainly not the
plethora of software/computer dedicated shops that we are now used to in the
U.K. and to have any hope of finding a reasonably stocked shop I had to enlist
the help of Kurt, a Swedish friend who was also an Amiga fanatic. Kurt took me
to two shops in Stockholm and in one I found to my delight, my first disk
magazine; issue No.1 of "Amnews", a Canadian product consisting of 3 disks
a set of instructions and contents list, no magazine though. This little lot
set me back approx £17.00. 

Both of these shops stocked a reasonable variety of leisure and serious
software as well as the usual peripherals.  Although I was not particularly
looking to buy any software, I definitely decided against any impulse buying
after comparing the prices of software to U.K. prices. To make things more
confusing, there is the Swedish equivalent of V.A.T. called "moms" which is
currently levied at 19% on all products.  However, if you buy from a shop that
takes part in the Tax Free Shopping Service, you can reclaim part of the
V.A.T. which you have paid on your purchases when you leave Sweden. One of
these shops offered this tax free service but it is only really worthwhile
when spending a lot of money and if you remember to get a special receipt!

All of the Amiga software titles are English/American imports and it does not
appear that Sweden has its own Software Industry. Both shops stocked recent
software releases although I was told that it can take up to 3 months before
these filter through. I decided to make some on-the-spot calculations and it
appeared that over 90% of leisure software was consistently £5.00 dearer
(R.R.P.) in Sweden than in the U.K.  However, the largest difference in price
was apparent when comparing  prices of software such as Deluxe Paint III
£139.00, SuperBase Personal 2 £129.50 and GFA Basic £139.50 (Swedish Prices). 
Prices for an A500 (no bundled software or extras) started from £500.00.

Although these two shops were good I found another one in the heart of
Stockholm's shopping precincts called "Stor & Liten" a large toy shop not
unlike Hamleys. In the computer section of this store, you could buy just
about any software title currently available for the Amiga as well as an
enormous range of peripherals, books , etc. You name it, they had it. The
same extensive range catered for PCs/ATARI/C64.  Needless to say this shop
was packed with just about every computer enthusiast in Sweden!!  However I
resisted the temptation to buy anything as I knew I could buy any of the
goods offered more cheaply in the U.K. 

Sweden does not have the equivalent of "W.H. Smith" and finding a good source
of Amiga magazines was difficult.  It was a case of trying every
tobacconists/newsagents that I came across. In any event, Amiga only mags,
written in English, were few and far between but perseverance eventually paid
off and I found "Amiga World" £4.90 - "Amigo Times" with disk £11.80 -
"Compute! Amiga Resource" £3.80 - "Amazing Amiga" £4.90 and several other
Commodore-related mags, the cheapest of which was £2.30. All these Amiga mags
are Canadian/U.S. and are, in my opinion, the best I have ever come across,
despite the Swedish prices. 

Believe me, and I am not prejudiced, (..well not a lot!), the Amiga is the
most popular computer in Sweden followed by the Atari ST, PCs and C64.

                     
                            **CHARLIE**