iPhone 4S Pre-Orders Sell Out

Perhaps to no one's surprise, the just-announced iPhone 4S has been been leaping off the shelves ... in advance of it ever hitting shelves at all. In fact, as reported by numerous sources (here's the WSJ's version), the company's pre-launch inventory has all been sold — and they only started taking the orders on Friday.

Comments

Perhaps to one's surprise?

[asto21]

WTF are you even talking about? iProducts have been selling out for a while now. How is this news?

Re:Perhaps to one's surprise?

[Macrat]

It's a surprise to all those people who wrote articles saying that few people would by the silly "upgraded" iPhone 4S and would wait for the "revolutionary" iPhone 5.

Re:Perhaps to one's surprise?

[Pieroxy]

These people are stupid, and everyone knows it, maybe except themselves. The iPhone is a good platform and people having one generally like sticking with it. There is such a thing as being "good enough".

My iPhone 3GS is showing signs of fatigue and I'm getting a 4S whenever I'll be able to get my hands on one. Because I like it. Because I like to tinker with stuff and my phone is not one of this stuff - mostly because of a lack of free time.

So I tinker with my desktop, my servers in my 45U bay in my garage. And I have an iPhone. And I like it. Enough to buy a new one.

Re:Perhaps to one's surprise?

[amiga3D]

This isn't the first time that industry "analysts" talked down an apple product that promptly flew off the shelves. It's pretty obvious that these guys' articles are not consulted by the customers that want these products. I still remember the dozens of articles I read about how the iPad would never sell. The dozens of articles about how zune would crush the iPod, etc., etc., etc. I read industry pundits' articles because I'm curious and like to hear peoples' opinions but I take them all with a full shaker of salt. Most of them don't really have a clue.

Who is "one one"?

[afabbro]

Perhaps to one one's surprise

Slashdot, please get rid of rubbish like 'timothy' and hire editors.

Re:Who is "one one"?

[drmitch]

"has been been"

Re:Who is "one one"?

[St.Creed]

Bonus points for ironic use of anonymous cowards anonimity to post this.

Maybe on purpose?

[LynnwoodRooster]

Has anyone thought that maybe Apple purposefully restricts inventory at release, thereby driving demand faster to "get in first", and also to build hype about how it sells out? Knowing what is coming, and that you'll sell millions per month after initial release, it shouldn't be such a big logistical issue to make 10 million for initial release, versus 7 million. But then, you lose the power of the marketing line "we've sold out already!" to continue driving demand...

Re:Maybe on purpose?

[ColdWetDog]

Or maybe is a complicated dance between getting the manufacturer to make x million in a certain time without any significant leakage of the product's specks or design. While Apple kept the idea of a modestly improved iPhone 4 pretty close to the chest (everybody was yapping about the magical iPhone 5 and a 'cheap' iPhone), they can't do it forever. They had to package and ship everything somewhere. They had to organize the event. Maybe they would have liked x + y million but just settled on what they could get.

Don't forget, these are complex little devices and not all that easy to manufacture in quantity.

Really no need to get all wrapped up in your tin foil - it works better without all the creases anyway.

Re:Maybe on purpose?

[mrbrown1602]

Or you could manufacture hundreds of thousands, or perhaps even millions of them, ship them to stores, and not sell more than a few hundred or thousand (Samsung? HP?).

Re:Maybe on purpose?

[aiken_d]

Ah, the old "scarcity conspiracy" theory. It wouldn't be Slashdot without it. It's like the flat-earth version of marketing.

Apple may know that they are going to sell out, but I guarantee you there is no way in hell that they are better off selling fewer phones than they would be selling more. Maybe someone, somewhere who wouldn't have otherwise bought an iPhone in January will now do so after remembering a shortage and thinking that signals a superior product. But thousands of times more people (which is to say, thousands of people) will go to a store with the intent of buying an iPhone and end up buying something else when their first choice isn't available. And those are customers Apple will lose for at least a year.

Apple would rather satisfy every drop of demand at launch. Because they've decided to launch knowing they can't doesn't mean they want shortages, it just means they're better off launching today with shortages than in November (or December) with enough stock.

Shortage vs. Price

[Ichijo]

If they had sold them on eBay, they wouldn't have run out.

pundits

[feldsteins]

Many tech pundits should be surprised. They were so busy writing about what a disappointment iPhone 4S was that they neglected to notice the fact that preorders sold out in one day.

Headlines if they did NOT sell out:

[Sebastopol]

"Consumers sour on Apple: Unsuccessful launch leads to glut of 4S supply"

"Apple i4S a flop"

"Apple at the end of its line? i4s overstock causes book to bill ratios to drop in Q1'12"

"Apple has lost its spark: failure to sell out like other products proves i4s is a failure: stock down 20% on concerns of apple's future"

And so on...

its a lose lose.

Apple Always Screws Up the Supply Chain

[Doc Ruby]

Whenever Apple introduces a new model or product, there's never enough to meet demand. To fans, that must look like quite a desirable achievement, and why not? Selling out seems the definition of maximum success.

But why doesn't Apple just make more? They aren't making the maximum amount. They're leaving some customers with money and no satisfaction. What Apple does is underestimate the needs of their customers. And is encouraged by all the PR from the "selling out - maximum success" fallacy.

Since the 1980s Apple has been scaring businesses away from using their products for this very reason. Which business wants to depend on PCs for every one of 150 people quickly hired in Q4, but then those amazing Macs just aren't available? Who cares how good they are when you can't get them? This is not some speculative argument. I worked for Northern Telecom in the mid 1990s, when it was (famously) Apple's biggest customer. I was part of an R&D group that was in the debate there to drop Apple for Microsoft (and, I think, HP) instead. The reason was the undependable Apple supply chain. The risk (that often came true) of no PC on the desks of new hires was a constant roadblock there. And this was a company very well dedicated to Apple, in public and in capital investments. They dropped Apple.

So long as Apple keeps having this problem, and keeps treating it like a triumph, Apple will continue to be ignored by serious businesses.

Re:Apple Always Screws Up the Supply Chain

[Antisyzygy]

The problem is that Apple makes their products seem scarce artificially. They have tried to seem like a small "for the consumer" company, they try to seem like they cater to their "elite" customers whims, they have a reputation for producing products for the wealthier, their advertising tends to portray Mac users as some kind of savvy elite class, and then even though they know their products routinely sell out, they don't even bother to try and get production up so it will accommodate demand. Im sorry, but Apple products are over-priced for what their actual costs are. Apple has the highest profit margin of any company because it doesn't sell its stuff cheaply, and it does so by over-limiting supply and over-inflating demand.

Re:Apple Always Screws Up the Supply Chain

[aiken_d]

Well, you're pretty sure of yourself. So please let me know if you ever get a job in operations so I can short your company's stock.

Sales projections for devices like iPhones tend to spike at the introduction, curve down, then level out. It would be insane to gear up for production at peak demand levels, because some or most of it would be idled as demand dwindles after the big launch. Companies address this by estimating average demand over a 6 or 12 month period, estimating initial demand, starting production early and stockpiling inventory, and then adjusting production volume based on actual demand.

And I guess you're calling the 7% of for fortune 500 that don't have official iPhone programs the serious ones? The other 465 of them are stupid amateurs who know better?