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February 20, 2014

BlackBerry Expresses its Anger at T-Mobile's iPhone Offer

I can understand John Chen’s outrage at T-Mobile’s offer of a great deal on an iPhone to its BlackBerry users. The fact that the offer was made to BlackBerry users does show a hint of trying to eliminate it from the shelf.

I believe that it was back in September 2013 that T-Mobile announced that while it would still offer BlackBerry devices, it would no longer stock the smartphones on its shelves. The reason given was that they were failing to sell in any significant quantity.

In response to the fact that BlackBerry customers complained on social media channels, BlackBerry CEO, John Chen sat down and wrote a 275 word blog. One customer wrote, "As a T-Mobile customer I felt like you don't want to support Blackberry at all. So I'm thinking about switching."

Part of Chen’s blog stated, "I can assure you that we are outraged too. What puzzles me more is that T-Mobile did not speak with us before or after they launched this clearly inappropriate and ill-conceived marketing promotion. I would like to remind you that our long-standing partnership was once productive and profitable for both Blackberry and T-Mobile. I hope we can find a way forward that allows us to serve our shared customers once again."

If you have been following along the BlackBerry timeline, you know that it has lost quite a bit of ground in the corporate world to Apple, as well as Samsung. There are also government offices that have cut back the number of BlackBerry smartphones they use.

In his blog, Chen also spoke about its customers’ loyalty, partnership and commitment to the brand. In response by way of a Tweet, T-Mobile CEO, John Legere said, “We give our customers choices, but you don’t have to give up your loyalty. We will continue to support.” Of course, it doesn’t help that in the offer it states, “designed especially for you.”

T-Mobile’s bottom line stand is that its customers would not have to give up their BlackBerry devices. It was offering these customers a choice. Undeniably however, with phrases like it’s “a great offer for BlackBerry customers” and the fact that this choice was given specifically to BlackBerry users and wasn’t just a general offer, I’ll leave the end of this sentence to you.




Edited by Cassandra Tucker


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