UK iPhone struggling under latest discount plans
updated 01:30 pm EDT, Mon April 20, 2009
UK iPhone sales sluggish
Sales of the iPhone are faring poorly at third-party UK vendor Carphone Warehouse, writes The Telegraph. The official carrier for the UK, O2, recently enacted new discounts, in which an 8GB iPhone is free with a £35 monthly subscription, and a 16GB model is free with a £45-per-month plan. Either option also requires agreeing to a two-year contract, however, rather than a standard 18-month period.
The extended contract is said to be one of the major obstacles to adoption, as an initial £100 in savings may be outweighed by the minimum £210 demanded for an added six months of service. An anonymous source at Carphone Warehouse meanwhile notes that a number of people are holding out with the expectation of new hardware. "The price cut has made no difference to the number of iPhones sold," says the source. "No one is buying the phone because everyone believes Apple will launch a new handset this summer."
Free iPhone?
04/20, 02:05pm (1 reply) reply
Well That may have gotten me on board if ATT did that. is 45 pounds a lot of money or are people just that wary of contracts?
Sondjata
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"Believes"?
04/20, 02:06pm reply
Everyone "knows"... Supply chains should take into account obvious updates.
njfuzzy
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BREAKING!!
04/20, 02:15pm reply
This just in! UK companies surprised that consumers aren't idiots!! More at 10:15PM!
dagamer34
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Duh!
04/20, 03:41pm reply
AKA Osbourne effect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osborne_effect
glowingcactus
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Doomed from the start...
04/20, 04:09pm reply
Those blokes in the U.K. never quite took to the iPhone. Sales there were laggard from the very beginning. The iPhone cost too much money and not enough features for them. I thought it was only the Scotts that were tight with their purse-strings. Apparently their economic heritage spread throughout the entire country. Maybe it would be better if Apple just skipped the U.K. entirely and let Nokia have run of the country.
Even though O2 says they're holding out for the next version iPhone, I don't picture them buying the next version, either.
Constable Odo
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Re: Believes
04/20, 04:19pm reply
Sorry, njfuzzy, but everyone 'believes' there will be an update. They may think they "know" it, but no one does, because no one outside apple has a clue what they're going to do in the next 3-6 months.
People "know" there will be an OS 3.0 update this summer (or fall). And that it will be free for all iPhone owners.
But maybe the prospective iPhone owners have to learn the hard way that us Mac owners learned years ago. You can't anticipate when Apple will release new hardware or software. You can hope. You can look at history. But in the end, if Apple decides it wants to keep the iMac un-updated for a year, it will do just that. And the same with the iPhone.
A bigger problem for Apple will be if this issue exacerbates. What about the 'new' hardware is people waiting for? Because if Apple releases a new 2x3G iPhone and that's it, but a majority were waiting because they 'heard' it was coming with a video camera, espresso maker, and built-in Taser, there might be a pent-up anger that will keep them from buying the iPhone out of stubborness and the belief they were 'lied' to.
testudo
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UK
04/21, 10:11am (1 reply) reply
It's true - the UK market as a whole doesn't seem to have taken to the iPhone much, and it's interesting, talking to a colleague who has just updated their Nokia 95, that he actually had a perception that the 'iPhone wasn't that good'.
I think Nokia have been far more successful in their counter-marketing in the UK, than their US rivals. Possibly because they actually had better, if not great, products.
(i.e. ones that sound like they have better features on paper, even if my colleague admits his new Nokia phone is still slow).
JulesLt
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