In just a matter of minutes after sales for the Gold iPhone 5S began online, the demand outweighed the supply.
Literally the Apple's iPhone 5S is playing a game of hard to get. When the Gold iPhone initially went on sale shipping dates quickly slipped to seven to 10 days. In less than a half of an hour the shipping dates were moved back to October.
The U.K., France and Germany experienced the same type of situation. After the initial blitz of orders, Apple's online store pushed back the phone ship date to seven to 10 dates, and a few hours later extended them to October.
Pictured: iPhone 5S in Gold
Apple’s silver and space gray iPhone 5S devices are holding strong and their shipping dates are still set at seven to 10 days here in the U.S. In Germany, France, and the U.K., those models had ship dates of seven to 10 days, but now won't be deliverable until October either.
Taking notice of these issues with demand, Apple asked suppliers to increase production of gold iPhone 5S components.
This is the first time that Apple has launched two new iPhones at once. The iPhone top-end 5S is popular because it offers users a faster processor, new camera, and two new colors. Apple also added to its iPhone 5S a new fingerprint scanner. This scanner lets users unlock the phone, as well as validate iTunes purchases. It also offers a 64-bit A7 processor that is twice as fast as the A6 found in the iPhone 5.
Presales for the iPhone 5C began last Friday. As sales kicked off, Apple seemed to have enough in stock. It even offered release-day delivery up until mid-week of this week. The iPhone 5S is a whole different story. Apple is offering a limited amount of stock online.
Many of Apple's retailers got an earlier start on 5S sales. Best Buy offered the phone for sale an hour before Apple did. This opportunity offered some consumers to get their phones early, and a few lucky shoppers got same-day-in-store pickup.
Apple says that it expects to meet or surpass last year's opening weekend iPhone sales. Reports from Piper Jaffray and RBC Capital Markets suggest that, "Apple is on track to meet and possibly exceed last year's five million iPhone 5 weekend sales (which included preorders) with five million to six million units in early sales."
It is expected that Apple will release its first weekend sales figures, which also include preorders, on Monday.
Edited by
Alisen Downey