Best Buy Only Selling Less Than 10% Of Their HP TouchPad Stock

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The webOS operating system is popular among a certain group of folks, and there was a lot of anticipation for the first webOS tablet – the HP TouchPad. The TouchPad has come out, and while it received middling reviews, a new report says that Best Buy stores across the country are sitting on unsold heaps of the device.

Multiple sources who talked to AllThingsD (a technology site affiliated with the Wall Street Journal) have leaked that Best Buy has nationally ordered 270,000 HP TouchPads from HP. Of that 270k, it’s being alleged that only 25,000 have been sold at retail by Best Buy, with one source telling the website that 25k was “charitable”. Ouch. They go on to say that Best Buy wants HP to buy the unsold TouchPads back from them, because it’s taking up that precious space in their retail stores and warehouse.

The reports of a less than 10% sell-through are consistent with what we’ve seen from the price cuts – or slashes rather – on the HP TouchPad. The device saw a scattering of $50 and $100 sale prices before HP made the $100 official. Considering that all retailers are basically selling the TouchPad for more or less the same price in the abstract, it’s very likely that the TouchPad is seeing poor sales everywhere – not just Best Buy.

As you may be aware, tablet manufacturers have found it hard to compete with the Apple iPad and iPad 2 in the market, even with some strong competitors like (in my opinion)  the Motorola Xoom or the flawed but promising BlackBerry PlayBook. The question stands – can anything beat the Apple iPad?