On my ongoing travels around the local shopping centre, I also managed to catch up with the shop frontage for Vodafone and T-Mobile (to see what Orange and O2 have in their shop windows, check out Pt. 1 here).
Vodafone
Vodafone had an interesting mix in their shop window on the day that I walked past – first of all, their was the Vodafone H1 – their new social-networking-centric device (made by Samsung), with a stack of neat, innovative features – such as having your contacts floating on screen in a 3D visual – nice. There was also the obligatory (it seems) deal on offer too, with a couple of their promo handsets. Methinks the frontage will change significantly once the iPhone 3G(S) goes live in (probably) January!
T-Mobile
The T-Mobile shop was extremely … er … pink! As you can see from the slightly under-exposed picture, there were two posters in the windows, and you’ll have to believe me when I say they were offering deals – although one of them was focused on the Nokia 5800 Chrome edition – which is, unsurprisingly, a Nokia 5800 with a Chrome edging around it. Hmmm, nice.
Overall then, across the 4 big carriers, It would seem that the general trend this year is to try and attract people in to deals that are cheap on a monthly basis, feature a half-decent handset, but I suspect, run for 24 months. What better way to sure up your incoming revenue stream in these tough financial times, than get people on 2-year contracts. I hope that doesn’t become the standard 🙁
Check out my follow-up post where I check out two of the big independents, Phones4U and Carphone Warehouse.