News
Apple forced to close store after iPhone madness
Ben Furfie Jul 14 2008, 10:59am
Comments (7)
Police called to ensure doors shut without trouble from queuing masses
Apple was forced to call in the police on Friday to help it close its Regent Street store at 3pm, after problems with O2's authorisation system meant that customers wishing to purchase a 3G iPhone were facing a three hour wait.
Staff at the store were forced to tell the queue, which by that point had snaked around the corner onto Oxford Street, that the store was closed and that they weren't able to guarantee that they would receive an iPhone anyway.
The problems saw the store close to those wishing to browse, or make purchases other than the iPhone, with the police called in to make sure things didn't turn sour.
Source: MacWorld
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Comments
“I'm not surprised”
Posted by: Alex Jacob - Jul 14, 12:40pm
I'm not too surprised something like this happened to be honest. It's a bit mad to whip up people into a lather over a product and then only ship enough stock for a fraction of them. Bound to irritate people.
“Re: I'm not surprised”
Posted by: Roaming Mac - Jul 14, 1:14pm
This is so funny!! I wish someone could upload the youtube video of this..kinda reminds of the IKEA stampage a little while ago.
Well, I guess people know the Apply strategy by now..
relase B&W; IPOD; then a few months later release colour IPOD; then a few months later release video IPOD; then release small IPOD; then even smaller IPOD; then release basic IPHONE; then release 3G IPhone..
The funny thing is that it always works.
I am just curious to see what will they come up as THE next design product 'cos they have made cool GUI OS, fluoroscent PCs, bendy screens, small music player, smartphones
Whats the next "cool" thing people will like to buy in millions...million dollar question that one!
PS> BTW, I am/was the proud owner of most of the above mac gadgets..
“Re: Re: I'm not surprised”
Posted by: Darrin - Jul 14, 1:49pm
This is very very sad indeed. WHy are these people queueing anyways? I saw queues outside carphone warehouse on my to work at 8:30am, get a life seriously.
“Re: Re: Re: I'm not surprised”
Posted by: LD - Jul 14, 2:31pm
Who has the time to go and Q outside stores anyway, do these people not work? I am up for new technology as much as the next person, but would at least wait until my contract was up for renewal. These people are impatient and materialistic.
“Re: Re: Re: Re: I'm not surprised”
Posted by: RetailerX - Jul 14, 3:27pm
The thing is, you have to bear in mind, some of these people's contracts are up for renewal and they simply can't wait two, three months for the next batch to come in; they'd have had to go and get another phone in the mean time and it might be another 18 months before they can get an iPhone at which point they might not be able to again because of low stocks.
The only other time I think these type of queues are excusable is Christmas-time console and toy launches.
“Not Surprised”
Posted by: Julian - Jul 14, 6:37pm
Why didn't they think to do what I did? Call round to my local CW the day before and reserve one! duh!
“Re: Not Surprised”
Posted by: RetailerX - Jul 15, 10:41am
Because up until about a week before launch, they'd been telling people there would be no pre-order in store and that it would be first come first serve.