I was recently engaged in a conversation about the iPhone and the service I was getting from AT&T. As pretty much everyone knows at this point, the iPhone is exclusive to AT&T at this time. The merits of the deal seem reasonably clear for both Apple and AT&T in the deal. Apple gets a nice fat payment from AT&T for each iPhone sold, while AT&T is able to attract new customers who want the best phone on the market (yes, the iPhone is the best phone out right now…and I don’t even have a 3GS yet). Seems like a great concept, but that analysis leaves out a key player, the customer.
So what about that pesky customer. What do they get out of the deal? Better pricing? Great Service? I’m not sure about pricing, the iPhone seems reasonably priced compared to similar offerings like the Pre and I suppose the G1. Definitely not great service. After switching from Verizon, I can say without a doubt that AT&T’s coverage is significantly worse. Not necessarily terrible. But not good either. Why couldn’t I just use my iPhone on Verizon’s excellent network? Because of that exclusive deal.
I started this post with the iPhone as my primary example, but there are many more: EA Sports exclusive with the NFL, which wiped out the excellent NFL offering from 2k Sports back in the day. The NFL’s deal with DirecTV isn’t much better. I couldn’t get their Sunday Ticket games package on Comcast, which makes life tough for a transplanted New Englander who needs to watch the Pats each week. Or Howard Stern being only on Sirius. Or the shows and events that only let you buy tickets online from Ticketmaster, who just so happens to charge a nice 8 dollar convenience fee for each ticket.
In every instance of an exclusive deal between two, usually big, businesses, it seems the customer is always the last priority. I’m not sure of the solution, because in the case of the exclusive, you’re usually being forced to choose between the best and something that isn’t nearly as good (why else would the company be paying for it). So I’ll continue to suffer through dropped calls and slow downloads, but continue to hope that someday, someone will step up and do something with the customer in mind.