Last week, the Palm Pre launch date was announced. There has been a lot of speculation in recent weeks about when this would happen, as well as a couple of leaked dates, neither of which was correct. Now it’s official: The Palm Pre will be available through Sprint on June 6.
Right on the heels of this announcement came a caveat. Sprint is anticipating a shortage of the Pre for a while after the launch date. According to Reuters, Sprint’s CEO, Dan Hesse, said at an investors conference:
“We don’t intend to advertise it heavily early on because we think we are going to have shortages for a while. We won’t be able to keep up with demand for the device in the early period of time.”
The first thought after hearing this might be, what the heck is Sprint doing releasing it when they don’t have enough product to meet demand? That seems to go against the most basic of sales principles, doesn’t it? Sprint runs the risk of disappointing existing customers who want to switch, or worse, sending potential customers straight into the arms of AT&T, which will almost assuredly begin marketing the third generation iPhone very soon.
Or is Sprint making a brilliant move? With all they hype leading up to this launch, an announcement of expected shortages may just increase demand and encourage people to scoop them up as quickly as they can to beat the rush.
If that is the case, Sprint and Palm are playing fast and loose with the product on which both companies are pinning their hopes of revitalization. That is, if there really is a shortage, and starting a rumor about one isn’t just another marketing ploy.
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