AT&T clerk didn't want to sell me an iPhone

[mojohanna]

It seems as if AT&T doesn't have much iPhone pride. They haven't advertised it, which I can understand, but they're also hyping Blackberry products more than ever right now.

With all of the hype still out there, why would at&t bother to spend additional money, hence impacting slim margins, now? The press and the blogosphere is doing all of the advertising Apple and at&t need right now. Not to mention, I am sure that many of the ads out there now are co-oped between Apple and at&t.

Wait about 6 months or so once all of the hoopla dies down. at&t will probably start advertising it more.

 

[Twinkie]

It seems as if AT&T doesn't have much iPhone pride. They haven't advertised it, which I can understand, but they're also hyping Blackberry products more than ever right now.

How many iPhone news stories have you seen on TV, in magazines, in newspapers, and online?

Now try to remember how many Blackberry Curve news stories you've seen in the mass media. Then ask yourself why AT&T would spend money marketing the iPhone when so many other outlets are doing it for them for free.

 

[dougbrowne]

Wait, your blackberry has Wi-Fi? And the unlimted data plan is only 20 bucks(with 200 texts)? It has built in 4GB/8GB of storage? Syncs with iTunes? Full touch screen?

Wow RIM stepped it up!

LOL!! OWNT!!

 

[sigamy]

Hey all...OP here.

Just to clarify, yes I meant to say "move from Verizon".

While I do hear the arguments that the iPhone is overkill for my wife, I disagree that it is way over her needs.

IMHO the iPhone keyboard will be much better for my wife than a Treo or Curve keyboard. Another reason for the iPhone is she currently has an iPod mini that she uses in the car and in the kitchen connected to an inMotion. The iPhone will replace the iPod mini and I'll ebay it for a few bucks.

She will use the web and email. She's not a road warrior but she will get good use out of these features.

Combine those issues with the fact that Treos and Windows Mobile won't sync well (or at all) with a Mac and I'm closer to justifying the iPhone.

ps--my hidden motivation is that I'll buy an 8gb and give her my 4gb...

 

[alanisrox69]

The clerks get commission on phone sales.

For every X phones they sell they get X bonus.

Apple iPhones are EXCLUDED from this bonus.

The clerks don't get any bonus'. In fact there is no markup on the phones at all since it's an "Apple" price controlled product, like the iPod, etc etc. Yes, Cingular/ATT has a contract to sell the phone, and I'm sure there are specific amounts in that contract that ATT gets off the sales of the iPhones, but store employees don't get any commission for selling an iPhone.

-Derek-

 

[GoCubsGo]

He didn't say one positive thing about the iPhone and then he said "why spend $500 when she only needs a $250 phone?"

he was probably right. By your description she didn't need that much of a phone. Most of the people here do not but that's their deal and it's cool.

So, was he just trying to save me money or is AT&T not pushing the iPhone due to Apple's share of the monthly service fees?

</paranoid apple fanboy mode>

I believe that he was. I commend him for such an act and really find it funny that you let yourself get like that over something just because it was Apple. You should have thanked him for at least trying to save you cash.

 

[mojohanna]

The clerks get commission on phone sales.

For every X phones they sell they get X bonus.

Apple iPhones are EXCLUDED from this bonus.

The clerks don't get any bonus'. In fact there is no markup on the phones at all since it's an "Apple" price controlled product, like the iPod, etc etc. Yes, Cingular/ATT has a contract to sell the phone, and I'm sure there are specific amounts in that contract that ATT gets off the sales of the iPhones, but store employees don't get any commission for selling an iPhone.

-Derek-

I would be careful in stating that at&t does not make any margin on the phone itself. Granted, their margin is based heavily on the fact that they are seing monthly revenue from the service, but there is still a cost of distributing the phone that they must cover. at&t would be stupid to at least cover their distribution cost on the sales of the iPhone. With that reasoning, the Apple Stores are making no margin on Apple products either.
In the very least, they are breaking even on the phone, therefore buying it at a few points to 10 points less than what they are selling it for. That means they are making at most $60 a unit on the phone before they cover any of their fixed costs. If this is the case, it would stand to reason they would not pay a commission (variable cost) due to not having enough margin to cover fixed and variable costs. Why would at&t futher subsidize Apple by essentiall selling the phone at a loss when they are also giving Apple a cut of the monthly service fees?

 

[PowerFullMac]

Reminds me of when the guy in The Link told me the Nokia N91 was a pile of crap. I was surprised as I thought the more expensive the phone is the more the guy gets payed, and the N91 was new and expensive at the time.

 

[iBlue]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A469a Safari/419.3)


...

this may be hard for you to hear, I hope you are sitting down.

OK.

Not everyone holds Apple with such high regard, so unconditionally as an fanboy. Some people actually form an opinion based on facts and preferences.

I suspect this rebeliious salesman just gave it how he saw it, much to your apple loyalist dismay.
It will be ok. You can still buy things you don't really need without their approval.
Wallets at the ready...

 

[havok5178]

Really?

Not everyone holds Apple with such high regard, so unconditionally as an fanboy. Some people actually form an opinion based on facts and preferences.

I suspect this rebeliious salesman just gave it how he saw it, much to your apple loyalist dismay.
It will be ok. You can still buy things you don't really need without their approval.
Wallets at the ready...

This may be the most condescending trash I've ever heard. I'm all for people having whatever opinion they want to have on the iPhone or anything else. I also believe it's not a phone for everyone. I like it, but I persuaded my mom not to get it, even though she was smitten, because she wasn't familiar with iTunes and didn't want to learn.

However: AT&T salespeople, in general, have proven themselves to be uninformed noobs. Take for example their little game trying to tell the first wave of iPhone buyers that they HAD to purchase accessories or they couldn't buy the phone.

Maybe it really was the salesperson's honest opinion, but more likely it was motivated by the desire to make more money, since OMG that's why he's there. Or maybe he just didn't feel like selling another iPhone. Who knows. But to trash this guy because he wanted to buy an iPhone is ridiculous. Salespeople are still there to sell things. If I walk into a store and ask to buy a certain product, it's the salesperson's responsibility to ::gasp:: sell it to me.

And to simply belittle this person because he wants to buy something that you personally don't like is idiotic. I personally think Blackberry's are the dumbest devices in the world, but I certainly don't pass judgements on those who have them.

And finally not all peope who love Apple products, love ALL Apple products. Just because I like Apple doesn't make me an emotional retard ready to whip open my wallet for every product they create. I really like Apple the company, but I didn't buy an TV because, even though I thought it was a good product, it wasn't right for me.

Condescension has no place in polite society.

 

[Gonzlobo]

However: AT&T salespeople, in general, have proven themselves to be uninformed noobs. Take for example their little game trying to tell the first wave of iPhone buyers that they HAD to purchase accessories or they couldn't buy the phone.

Has this rumor ever been proven?

 

[boss1]

Nice!

ps--my hidden motivation is that I'll buy an 8gb and give her my 4gb...

el oh el . And I thought the AT&T salesman was the only one trying to pull one over here.

This is starting to turn into the Macrumors version of Oceans 11

:::::Grabs Popcorn::::::

 

[boss1]

you people are crazy.

the guy was being honest, just because you're a mac fanboy does not mean the iphone is the greatest phone out there..... you just WANTED him to recommend an iphone so you could rationalize your purchase.....not everyone is a shady salesman, believe it or not there are honest people left in this world.

I think you may be correct sir. But that doesn't make the salesman honest.

 

[DaveGee]

Not shocked...not everyone is an Apple fan, in fact there are some anti-Apple fans.....or comission, doesn't think your wife needs the iPhone, thinks other phones met your wife's needs better

Apple fan or Apple hater that should NOT enter into the picture when it comes to sales...

Number ONE rule in sales is..... CLOSE THE SALE!

The salesman is an idiot... A customer comes in and says he wants to move his wife from Verizon to AT&T and then says he ALREADY has an iPhone for himself... This should have been a no brainer for the 'ahem' salesman... "Well sir... how do you like your iPhone? (great!) Okay then, why not go with that... perhaps the 4GB model? You've gotta know she'll love it... and she'll love **you** for getting it for her!"

Shoot... this is sales 101 here... The customer is ALWAYS right.

Dave

 

[sblasl]

The real reason... They only had one left in stock and he has finally saved up his last 6 weeks of paychecks and he was planning on buying the last one in stock when he got off the clock.

 

[PowerFullMac]

Apple fan or Apple hater that should NOT enter into the picture when it comes to sales...

Number ONE rule in sales is..... CLOSE THE SALE!

The salesman is an idiot... A customer comes in and says he wants to move his wife from Verizon to AT&T and then says he ALREADY has an iPhone for himself... This should have been a no brainer for the 'ahem' salesman... "Well sir... how do you like your iPhone? (great!) Okay then, why not go with that... perhaps the 4GB model? You've gotta know she'll love it... and she'll love **you** for getting it for her!"

Shoot... this is sales 101 here... The customer is ALWAYS right.

Dave

Defiantly agree there, but if he was smart he wouldnt be a salesman lol.

 

[iBlue]

really?

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A469a Safari/419.3)

This may be the most condescending trash I've ever heard. I'm all for people having whatever opinion they want to have on the iPhone or anything else. I also believe it's not a phone for everyone. I like it, but I persuaded my mom not to get it, even though she was smitten, because she wasn't familiar with iTunes and didn't want to learn.

However: AT&T salespeople, in general, have proven themselves to be uninformed noobs. Take for example their little game trying to tell the first wave of iPhone buyers that they HAD to purchase accessories or they couldn't buy the phone.

Maybe it really was the salesperson's honest opinion, but more likely it was motivated by the desire to make more money, since OMG that's why he's there. Or maybe he just didn't feel like selling another iPhone. Who knows. But to trash this guy because he wanted to buy an iPhone is ridiculous. Salespeople are still there to sell things. If I walk into a store and ask to buy a certain product, it's the salesperson's responsibility to ::gasp:: sell it to me.

And to simply belittle this person because he wants to buy something that you personally don't like is idiotic. I personally think Blackberry's are the dumbest devices in the world, but I certainly don't pass judgements on those who have them.

And finally not all peope who love Apple products, love ALL Apple products. Just because I like Apple doesn't make me an emotional retard ready to whip open my wallet for every product they create. I really like Apple the company, but I didn't buy an TV because, even though I thought it was a good product, it wasn't right for me.

Condescension has no place in polite society.

polite society you say?

http://upc.*************/uploads/macros/condescending.jpg


I was being sardonic. You can hardly blame me. There's a lot of unconditional apple buttkissing around these parts and sometimes it just knots even the toughest of stomachs.

My post stands where applicable and can offend accordingly. If you're not included then un-furrow your brow, mate.

 

[Mr. MacPhisto]

My guess would be that's it's a mixture of commissions and honesty. Most the people that buy and iPhone don't need it. They buy it because they are technogeeks that have to have the latest and greatest.

I personally think the iPhone is cool but impractical. There are a lot of problems with it. Lack of a removable battery is one for me. The fact that it's on AT&T is another because AT&T is the second worst cell company in the States after T-Mobile. I'll never buy an Apple phone unless they allow Verizon to sell them and Verizon really doesn't care about Apple.

I'd probably advice most all customers not to buy the iPhone because it's a ripoff compared to the other devices you can get for much cheaper. I'm also an Apple geek, but I think iPhone and AppleTV are the two worst products that Apple has put out in the past few years. iPhone is going to be initially successful, but I'm interested to see what the numbers will be in a year. I have a feeling that AT&T may try to pull the plug on the iPhone within two years when they get tired of Apple and realize that the initial hype wasn't enough to sustain the iPhone. Once all the technogeeks get theirs and the phones begin to have problems then it'll start going down really fast.

 

[skye12]

I used to work for GTE Wireless which became Cingular which is now ATT.

This is the deal. The salesman are highly driven by commissions and
phone incentives different manufacturers have periodically. I can
speculate every competitior to Apple that ATT carries is heavily rewarding
the salespeople to NOT sell you an iphone. Every non iphone sale just
leaves an iphone to sell to someone with brains.

ATT doesn't care. They know they'll sell every iphone they get.

Its tough working in those stores, let me tell you. I did it sometimes.
Why? The American public CONSUMER is generally the most spoiled,
arrogant and rude jerks on the face of the earth. And they lie whenever
and for any reason whatsoever. A few, very few, are good folks. Soon
it will be automated so no one has to deal with anyone face to face lol.

 

[sigamy]

Apple fan or Apple hater that should NOT enter into the picture when it comes to sales...

Number ONE rule in sales is..... CLOSE THE SALE!

The salesman is an idiot... A customer comes in and says he wants to move his wife from Verizon to AT&T and then says he ALREADY has an iPhone for himself... This should have been a no brainer for the 'ahem' salesman... "Well sir... how do you like your iPhone? (great!) Okay then, why not go with that... perhaps the 4GB model? You've gotta know she'll love it... and she'll love **you** for getting it for her!"

Shoot... this is sales 101 here... The customer is ALWAYS right.

Dave

Agreed. This is what I expected to happen. And just to make it clear--I didn't leave the store in a huff, upset and crying that he didn't push the iPhone. Please.

And he wasn't negative about the iPhone, he just wasn't positive about it.
That struck me, as I think it would anyone (Apple fan or not), as strange.

You would think any store selling any product would at least push the new, shiny expensive product.

As for the people saying that my wife doesn't need an iphone, exactly what AT&T phone do you recommend? Here are the requirements: No Windows, good keyboard, good calendar app, ability to sync with a Mac.

 

[skye12]

Agreed. This is what I expected to happen. And just to make it clear--I didn't leave the store in a huff, upset and crying that he didn't push the iPhone. Please.

And he wasn't negative about the iPhone, he just wasn't positive about it.
That struck me, as I think it would anyone (Apple fan or not), as strange.

You would think any store selling any product would at least push the new, shiny expensive product.

As for the people saying that my wife doesn't need an iphone, exactly what AT&T phone do you recommend? Here are the requirements: No Windows, good keyboard, good calendar app, ability to sync with a Mac.

Actually, closing the sale is NOT the sole objective with leading edge companies. Its getting you the right product even over the customers objections. Why? Because if you get the wrong thing, you'll just be back
wasting the companies time and reducing profits.

A new paradyme is evolving-customers are often WRONG. And pains
should go somewhere else. Sprint is a good example of this.

 

[havok5178]

I was being sardonic. You can hardly blame me. There's a lot of unconditional apple buttkissing around these parts and sometimes it just knots even the toughest of stomachs.

My post stands where applicable and can offend accordingly. If you're not included then un-furrow your brow, mate.

No really, you were being condescending. Maybe you thought you were just mocking the original poster, but when your tone to an equal takes on that of parent to a mentally incompetant child, it's condescending.

Hey, I get it. I take everything that comes out of Apple with a grain of salt. I spent many years tethered to everything Microsoft to allow another company to spoon feed me again. But my experience with Apple has been more than stellar. I've had an iBook that they fixed for free when the screen stopped working, an intel iMac that has just been great, a couple of iPods that I've had no problems with, and now my Phone. I also run an entire office of Macs, and host a website/email with an XServe. So I don't have much bad to say about Apple.

But it seems that on these forums, there's just as much, if not more, unrestrained bashing of products. I see more trashing of people and less actual debating about products. And frankly, if you want to avoid people who love apple products, then maybe people whom they annoy should find a site not devoted to Macs. I don't much care for Microsoft products, but I don't prowl the Microsoft forums bashing everyone and their mom and I think it's silly that people do it here. That's all.

 

[darngooddesign]

why is everyone who doesn't recommend or like the iPhone either an "anti apple zealot" or iPhone hater? Is it impossible for someone to dislike the iPhone just because they don't like it? Do people really have to have a hidden agenda or be out to get Apple?

Why is every iPhone owner who loves the phone, is in no way bothered by the things it doesn't have, and is vocal about it called an Apple fanboy?

 

[question fear]

As for the people saying that my wife doesn't need an iphone, exactly what AT&T phone do you recommend? Here are the requirements: No Windows, good keyboard, good calendar app, ability to sync with a Mac.

I think the salesman probably had incentives, didn't know as much about the iphone as we do, and sees it as another commodity. He really might not have realized that you wanted to see if he'd recommend one, and might have been thinking the reverse; that you were looking to see if he'd suggest you drop what (to some people) is an astronomical amount to spend on a phone.

Having said that, I really think this is a moot point since we don't know for sure what was going through his head. But from your post above, here's what I would suggest if I were an AT&T sales rep:

BBerry Curve/Pearl
Nokia E61 if they have it.
Treo 680
If she is ok with T9, any Sony-Ericsson.
iPhone

So if I were totally device agnostic and just working someplace for a buck, I might throw out some other thoughts before I suggested the incredibly expensive phone.

Since you've posted, have you gotten your wife an iphone yet?

 

[mswlogo]

Wait, your blackberry has Wi-Fi? And the unlimted data plan is only 20 bucks(with 200 texts)? It has built in 4GB/8GB of storage? Syncs with iTunes? Full touch screen?

Wow RIM stepped it up!

He said she needed a Calendar. The portrait keyboard on the iPhone is very painful (at the moment anyway). However her requirement of viewing photos couldn't be satisfied better with any other phone than the iPhone.