The iPhone 3G S has got off to an incredible start with news reaching us that by lunchtime we’d sold more iPhone 3G S handsets than we sold iPhone 3G devices on launch day last year.
Sales are still going strong and we expect to have sold 50% more iPhone 3G S handsets than last year’s launch by the close of business today. Footfall to our shops this morning was 10 times higher than an average day and our online site saw a 150% increase in traffic.
More stock is being sent out to stores over the weekend with a further delivery early next week. It’s been interesting to see that the black iPhone 3G S is outselling the white one by 3:1.
Over half our iPhone customers are already benefiting from the iPhone OS 3.0 which went live on June 17 and is available to download through iTunes. This brings many benefits including MMS, cut, copy & paste, spotlight search and much more to iPhone customers for free.
So is that because people are more interested, or because you have more units in stock and your network hasn't crashed this year?
Posted by: Matt White | 19 June 2009 at 02:43 PM
Maybe this has something to do with the fact that each O2 store had around 10 units of the 3G in stock on launch day last year?! And then all your systems crashed within the first 5 minutes of opening, causing each transaction to take longer than 20 minutes...
Your statistics would suggest that 15 3GS iPhones have been sold per store before lunchtime - woohoo!
Posted by: Simon | 19 June 2009 at 03:24 PM
Don't believe that. My local O2 shop last year was queuing round the block. This morning- one guy was waiting!
Posted by: Wrighty | 19 June 2009 at 04:21 PM
Perhaps the reason why you've sold more iPhones this time than last is that this time, you have more than 3 iPhones per store. You also have stock of the white iPhone which, this time last year, you were virtually denying even existed.
Oh yes, and your systems seem to be handling things this time, unlike last year where your systems crashed 3 minutes into that firesale ;)
Posted by: Rob Howard | 19 June 2009 at 04:26 PM
Based upon my visit two TWO O2 stores in Scotland today (Clydebank & Buchanan Street) and talking to the sales staff I would say that O2 are bring "optimistic" - very iPhone 3GS phones sold according to O2 staff.
Posted by: Alex Waddell | 19 June 2009 at 09:33 PM
We did have retail systems issues last year but through quickly moving to back-up processes, we sold as many iPhone 3G devices as we could on launch day.
As expected, queues outside stores were not as long for the 3G S launch but we were also selling through our online shop and retention centres (something we didn't do for iPhone 3G). This gave other options for people who didn't want to go into store. Many customers also chose to benefit from many of the new features by upgrading to the 3.0 software.
That said, O2 stores were very busy on Friday and there were queues, something you never see for any other mobile phone.
Apple's announcement that they sold 1 million 3G S devices over the weekend backs up what we said around sales on Friday.
Posted by: O2 Press Office | 22 June 2009 at 04:11 PM