My 3G iPhone purchasing experience
When Steve Jobs announced the original iPhone in January 2007, I said that it would probably be the first Apple product I’d own. That’s right, I don’t own an iPod even though my wife and kids do. A couple months later I purchased a 24″ iMac. When the iPhone came out, I just couldn’t pay those high prices. I still wasn’t swayed to buy one even after the price reduction two months later in September. Steve Jobs’ spell couldn’t keep me in its grasp. Although my family will point out that I had a difficult time not talking about it. Mostly because my cell phones were frustrating me.
In February of this year I purchased my second Apple product, a 15″ Macbook Pro. At this point I was content to wait for the next generation iPhone. In the months that followed, rumor after rumor surfaced. June approached and I looked forward to Steve Jobs’ keynote at the World Wide Developer’s Conference. I expected, hoped actually, that he’d announce the phone and it would be available within two weeks. Unfortunately, he announced that it would be available on July 11, 2008, one month after the keynote. I was disappointed but I waited 18 months, so what’s one more.
Yesterday (as of this writing) was the big day: July 11th. My co-worker was on vacation this week so waiting in line before the store opened wasn’t an option. My plan was to monitor things via Twitter and the Internet news outlets and try to get one at lunchtime. I knew I’d probably have to take a longer lunch.
Only an hour after the iPhone went on sale in the Chicagoland area, I started to see reports of problems. Initial reports blamed the AT&T servers for activation delays. Reports followed stating that the iTunes activation portion (the unbricking) was failing. Regardless of who was to blame it became pretty obvious that the 10 minute activation process per phone was not a reality. I continued to monitor the online feeds and they were filled with complaints of activation woes. Word started to spread that at some stores people were being sold iPhones and told to take them home and activate them there, completely opposite of the procedure that was put into place by Apple and AT&T. While not a good thing, I saw a potential opportunity: this may speed up the process at the Apple store. I’d be content (not happy) to get the phone on Friday and activate it later, even if it meant a day or two. A trip to and from the Apple store over the weekend would have meant a two hour drive. Plus, I was concerned about supplies running out.
At lunchtime, as planned, I headed over to the Woodfield Apple Store in Schaumburg, IL. I was disappointed to see a long line of people that I estimated to be 400 initially, but realistically was more like 300. The demand coupled with the activation issues created a deep queue of customers. There was no way I was going to wait in line during lunch. So I opted for Plan B: return at 3pm and wait it out.
As the afternoon progressed, I monitored the term “activation” via Summize. About 1:30pm I noticed that more and more tweets (i.e. Twitter updates) about successful activations were coming through. By 2:30pm, the majority of activation tweets were about successful attempts. It appeared that Apple and AT&T finally got things under control. I called the Apple store and asked if they still had phones in stock and how many. I was informed that they had many but “could not comment on quantities.” When 3pm rolled around, I was ready to head over to get my first iPhone.
When I arrived at the Apple store, the line was shorter. There were only about 200 people in line. After 10 minutes the line moved to fill the gap of the ten people at the front that entered the store. They were letting in about 8 to 10 people at a time. The end of the line continued to fill with new people keeping it the same length.
I struck up a conversation with some people in front of and behind me in line. The young man in front of me had a time crunch. He had to catch a plane back to Jersy and had to leave before 5pm. I told him he’d probably get an iPhone if he could stretch it out to 5:30pm.
One woman I spoke with was getting a third iPhone, she bought two in early May having no clue that a new version would be coming out so soon. She was going to keep the new iPhone for herself and give her current one to her son. In fact, she was going to leave on the 7 hour drive to see her son right after she got the phone.Some of the people I spoke with were not very familiar with the new phone’s features so I shared what I knew, as well as filling everyone in on the activation issues being reported online.
The line kept moving forward every 10 minutes or so. After a half an hour, we all expected to be inside the store in another hour. Soon 4pm turned to 4:40 and the line wasn’t progress as quickly any longer. By 4:45pm the young man from Jersey quietly slipped out of line and headed out. By 5pm, we all started to get tired of standing for 2 hours and realized that we were still another 30+ minutes away from getting into the store.
We got closer and closer but it was still very slow going. When we finally reached the point where we’d be the next group to enter the store, things stalled. We stood there for 20 minutes. It was frustrating to be so close and yet be stuck. At this point were were approaching the 3 hour mark. One of the women had been sitting for most of the last hour. Since we were right by the store’s doors, an Apple employee was asking if everyone was okay. I requested that he get the woman some water and she added that she needed something to eat. He returned with a bottle of water and a few slices of pizza for her. Afterwards, she explained that she was hypoglycemic and that the food really helped.
We finally made it into the store only to find ourselves in a smaller line of 10 people. More waiting. It was in here that we finally found out why progressed had slowed from 4pm on.
We were joined in this short internal line by a newcomer. He wasn’t in line outside and he carried the iPhone bag. I asked him if he had just purchased the phone and was waiting for someone that was purchasing theirs. “No” he said and explained that he purchased his iPhone first thing this morning after waiting in line since 4am. Because of the activation problems encountered in the morning, they were told to come back after 4pm, at which time they’d be allowed into the internal line to activate their phones.
After about 20 minutes, I was finally next in line to be helped. I gave up my spot, allowing the woman with hypoglycema and the other with the 7 hour drive to go ahead of me. My turn came 5 minutes later. Rick, the Apple employee helping me, had only been there an hour and was still getting his barrings. The transaction went smoothly and I was out of there in about 15 minutes with my new white 16 GB 3G iPhone.
My total wait time was 3 1/2 hours. I can’t help but wonder if I got there at 2pm or even 1pm, if it would have been quicker.
Opportunities lost
While standing in line for over 3 hours I kept thinking of opportunities that could have been taken advantage of by Apple or any of the retailers in the mall. Here are just a few.
- Apple t-shirts – Apple gives their employees simple, yet cool t-shirts. As I saw people coming out of the store with their iPhone bag, I thought that Apple could have included a commemorative iPhone event t-shirt with each phone purchase. I’d be happy with a simple white t-shirt with a black Apple logo. The challenge here, of course, is the need for different sizes.
- Apple cInema displays outside the store – there were some good spots where the Apple store could have set up some of their 30″ cinema displays and run all of their movie trailers on them. Hell, they could have also been playing the iReady video from AT&T as a number of people in line weren’t familiar with the details. With all of the security guards around I don’t think having the displays outside the store would have been a problem. It would have helped break up the monotony of waiting in line. Plus, throw in an occasional Apple product ad; just don’t run constant ads.
- Food and drink for people in line – They may have been doing this in the morning, but with the lines in the afternoon just as long it would have been nice to provide some basics such as cookies and water. This doesn’t have to fall on the shoulders of Apple. There are a number of coffee shops and snack shops that could have either brought around food and drink, or taken orders for people. In my opinion there was “money left on the table” as the saying goes.
- Al Degutis
