Steve Jobs gives us $100 back — regardless!
Steve Jobs just posted an open letter on Apple.com, and we applaud you, Steve!
"To all iPhone customers:
I have received hundreds of emails from iPhone customers who are upset about Apple dropping the price of iPhone by $200 two months after it went on sale. After reading every one of these emails, I have some observations and conclusions.
First, I am sure that we are making the correct decision to lower the price of the 8GB iPhone from $599 to $399, and that now is the right time to do it. iPhone is a breakthrough product, and we have the chance to ‘go for it’ this holiday season. iPhone is so far ahead of the competition, and now it will be affordable by even more customers. It benefits both Apple and every iPhone user to get as many new customers as possible in the iPhone ‘tent’. We strongly believe the $399 price will help us do just that this holiday season.
Second, being in technology for 30+ years I can attest to the fact that the technology road is bumpy. There is always change and improvement, and there is always someone who bought a product before a particular cutoff date and misses the new price or the new operating system or the new whatever. This is life in the technology lane. If you always wait for the next price cut or to buy the new improved model, you’ll never buy any technology product because there is always something better and less expensive on the horizon. The good news is that if you buy products from companies that support them well, like Apple tries to do, you will receive years of useful and satisfying service from them even as newer models are introduced.
Third, even though we are making the right decision to lower the price of iPhone, and even though the technology road is bumpy, we need to do a better job taking care of our early iPhone customers as we aggressively go after new ones with a lower price. Our early customers trusted us, and we must live up to that trust with our actions in moments like these.
Therefore, we have decided to offer every iPhone customer who purchased an iPhone from either Apple or AT&T, and who is not receiving a rebate or any other consideration, a $100 store credit towards the purchase of any product at an Apple Retail Store or the Apple Online Store. Details are still being worked out and will be posted on Apple’s website next week. Stay tuned.
We want to do the right thing for our valued iPhone customers. We apologize for disappointing some of you, and we are doing our best to live up to your high expectations of Apple.
Steve Jobs
Apple CEO"
Is it even worth noting that a 100$ credit in apple products is NOT giving you money back?
Apple makes more then $100 profit on most of their products, Steve jobs is simply lowering profit margins on a small percentage of returning customers.
Is this good? Yes indeed. Is it something to write home about? Hell no. Plenty of companies who offer discounts to regular/returning customers.
But hey….let the Apple craze go on!
Go Go Go Steve Jobs! Me and and me iPhone be balllllling!!!!!
$100 will just make someone throw another 50-100 bucks down to buy another overpriced apple product, and boost apple sales one way or the other. I am with Galvatron on this one.
if you have bought the iPhone early, would you be taking the $100 credit? Or would you rather beat the system or the men and decline the $100.
I think apple is in “damage control” this is an AFTER THOUGHT.. I own the iphone, I paid 600, my local store gave me the price match, they have a loyal customer..
HOWEVER.. this my second apple product EVER.. I will never again buy a product from them in the first 100 days..
really are we all so simple that we overreacted to the drop, and now we overrreact just as much the other way when apple says “eh, cmon in, give us another 30 bucks, and you take out 50 bucks worth of stuff”
if the loyal fan / customer base was so important, apple would have instituted an “thank you” program at the unveil for the early adopters. Not as an after thought..
they showed you what they think of the first, most loyal, marketing customers.. you are worth an extra 200 bucks to them
me too, fool me once..
and the puppets continue to dance. I can’t believe he’s actually giving you cry babies any money back in the first place, but its not even money! lol At the press conference, he said that everyone with an iPhone already will buy the iPod touch also. He called you all his children, yet nobody cares to think for themselves. Most of you are forced to believe that you have to have these products. Now, he gives you $100 that you can put right back into Apple’s pocket. I’m so glad I’m not a sheep.
You know what $100 credit is great and Apple did it for as noted previously for damage control. But you know what in part the jobsman was right in that Technology changes daily and it does. But if you are the company selling product A and you know full well you will be introducing product B in 2-3 months that will result in you dropping product A pricing, well then you screwed the pooch on that one.
I told many people who wanted the iPhone to wait for iPhone 2.0 or at least wait a few months to see what happens. Some did and some didn’t and both sides were happy at the time and only the gotta have it were not happy.
Now the only thing that really irritates me is you cannot get the new iPod OS that is on the classic onto the new iPod 5.5 which is the same iPod. I certainly don’t want to get a new iPod just to get the cooler OS.
Oh well.
Pretty sure that $100 is not equal to $200.
Just goes to show that you are dumb, stupid, and an idiot for buying it when it came out.
Wow, the $100 rebate seems to have masked the fact from the fanboys :
iPhones werent selling as well as Apple expected, so they dropped their margins/price to sell more.
1. No company ruins a good thing if things are going rosy.
2. No company should ever give back money when they never promised it.
This drop was obviously unplanned, or else the 16GB iPhone would have been announced as the 4GB was dropped. One iPhone tier looks odd doesnt it?
Welcome to the big leagues of consumer eletronics.
Um they were in the big leagues before everyone else. stuff happens as they say but they are aggressively taking advantage of RIM and Palm’s weakness.
and the $100 is a sign of good faith, they want people to buy more in the future.
I wouldn’t call it a ‘weakness’ of RIM and Palm, they just cater to different markets. If the iPhone sells more, thats fine. BBs and PDAs/PPCs are for people who will make use of an office in their pocket. The iPhone is a trendy, pop-culture iconic device that for someone like me, is seriously lacking in features.
At least it’s something. What about the fools who paid $900 and upwards on Ebay and don’t get ANYTHING?