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Verizon, RIM pleased with BlackBerry Storm sales
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One month after its initial launch, new shipments of Research In Motion's BlackBerry Storm are coming into the United States, and both RIM and Verizon Wireless said they were pleased with how well the phone was selling.
The Storm, the first touchscreen BlackBerry, is being sold exclusively by Verizon for $199 with a two-year contract. Stores sold out of the phone on its initial launch on Nov. 21, and some customers complained at the time that stores were understocked. Verizon said yesterday that new shipments were coming into the Northwest, and Verizon spokeswoman Brenda Raney confirmed that shipments would be coming in to other parts of the country as well.
RIM, which posted stronger revenues for the third quarter yesterday, said it was pleased with how well the Storm was selling. The company said it was not able to meet product demand levels for North America, even though it replenished its supply of the phone; that Nov. 21 was the biggest single day for BlackBerry signups in the company's history; and that 75 percent of sales of the Storm are new customers.
Verizon also beat back rumors that were circulating on several blogs that there was a high return rate for the Storm. The blog Boy Genius Report quoted a Verizon spokesperson yesterday as saying that just the opposite was true. "The Storm has the lowest return rate of any of our PDAs and at this point in its life cycle, it has the lowest return rate of any PDA we currently sell," they said. Verizon has not released any sales numbers for the phone.
For more:
- see this release about the shipments
- see this post about RIM's news on the Storm
- see this post about the return rate
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Comments
Posted by Anonymous | December 19, 2008 - 1:47pm
Well, VZW and RIM may be pleased, but I’m not. I am just a Stormy customer. My Storm is foul weather. My Storm has no sunshine. It is a grey, low cloud of cold mist. It rains on my day. It freezes, it slips, and it smells. Think, I’ll return this Stormy device, and entertain my Curve...my true love.
Posted by DavidB | December 20, 2008 - 10:39am
Strange, a Verizon rep calls Storm a "PDA"??? Verizon really IS clueless when it comes to Blackberry smartphones. Like the corporate bigwig that flat out told me the only software I can run on a Blackberry is software that Verizon provides. If it weren't for the fact they have such good coverage for data service I can't imagine them selling a single smartphone device.
Posted by Anonymous | December 27, 2008 - 10:02am
I love my Storm. The updated software doubled the refresh rate and really upped the media load and playback. I've enjoyed it since I picked it up and have been literally attacked by strangers with questions and interest in its inner-workings. Previous Blackberry owner critics have spent a great deal of time complaining about its learning curve, but as a short term curve user and a long term 8800 and pearl user, I can say that it took just as much time to transition to each new model as it did for the Storm. I give it a firm 8.5 with room to grow.
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