Apple stores will have the iPhone on its June 24 launch date, but AT&T won't have them until June 29. And what about Apple's other retail partners?
The iPhone 4 will be going on sale at Apple stores on June 24—if anyone’s curious, that’s tomorrow—but it looks like retail and carrier partner AT&T is going to be out in the cold for the first days of consumer enthusiasm: AT&T has announced it won’t start selling the iPhone 4 until June 29. Instead, the company is focusing on filling pre-orders made through it’s Web site and retail stores up through June 15.
An AT&T spokesperson said that the exceptional high number of pre-orders for the iPhone 4 were the cause of the retail delay. Apple said more than 600,000 pre-orders for the iPhone 4 were placed on its first day of availability, leading to a meltdown of AT&T’s customer verification systems. AT&T says it plans to get iPhones this week to customers who were able to battle their way through the initial pre-order crush.
Pre-orders for the iPhone 4 are still available through Apple’s Web site, but not all configurations are available and Apple isn’t promising to have new orders into customers’ hands until July 14.
In the meantime, seemingly huge demand for the iPhone 4 has some industry watchers calling into question Apple’s other retail partners’ ability to meet customer demand. Reports are already circulating the Best Buy locations may not have iPhones on hand for retail sales tomorrow; the device is also supposed to go on sale at Walmart and Radio Shack. Some pundits and industry watchers are already wondering if the iPhone 4 will be hard to set hands on for weeks or even months after its formal launch.
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