Nordic giants in retailer competition: Nokia wins on knock-out
(Hi Tero, thanks for the fast mirroring, here is the "full story" from the source)
Patrik Holmstr”m, Finanstidningen Swedish Daily Financial Newspaper Online. 2000-04-13. Stockholm
Retailers recommended Nokia 8210 instead of Ericsson T28. Nokia wins over Ericsson in the shop. Ericsson"s flagship looses the fight among retailers. Swedish financial magazine FINANSTIDNINGEN has visited 14 stores in central Stockholm, and in 13 cases Nokia 8210 is recommended instead of Ericsson"s T28.
The investigation was executed during 2 days and ended in a knock-out victory for Nokia. In almost every store the Finnish model 8210 was pointed out as a better alternative than T28. Only 1 of the retailers chooses Ericsson instead of the Nokia phone. And at Ericsson"s they are worried.
"Naturally this is a problem. When you as a customer comes to a store you are very dependent of the advice you get from the personnel in the shop. If they categorically recommend an other product, then that is not a good thing", says Per K”rner, product market chief at Ericsson"s Swedish sales company.
T82 has been suffering from many problems. At the beginning there was a shortage of phones. The early series" also had problems with the cover and the batteries, problems that are now corrected according to both retailers and Ericsson. But Per K”rner does not think that these early "childhood-diseases" are the reasons why retailers recommend Nokia"s phone. Instead the time for the investigation is the reason:
"Our retailers are always hungry for news and 8210 was presented later than our model. That is the only reasonable explanation I can see", he says.
But when you ask the retailers it is above all Nokia"s superior stand-by time which is the reason to why they recommend the Finnish phone instead of the Swedish, 150 h compared with 55 h for the Ericsson standard mode phone. In addition to the stand-by time many retailers are stressing that the T28 is fragile, that Nokias phone is markedly more robust.
Despite that T28 is not the favourite of the retailers, it sells well. In all shops they say that the selling of phones is evenly divided between the two models, and that picture is confirmed by Ericsson. Ericsson has lowered the price of the T28, which is now about 1000-1500 Swedish Crowns cheaper than Nokia"s model.
"After the price was lowered, the selling was speeded up markedly", says one of the retailers in the investigation.
But that lowering the price should be a panic action to save market shares is denied from Ericsson:
"It is always so, that a new product gets a higher price in the beginning. When the product then gets older, the price decreases. There is nothing peculiar with that price reduction", says Per K”rner.
At the retailer GEAB they thing that Nokias earlier successful presentations of models have spread to the new model.
"Nokia"s commitment during the fall has been very succesful. They have presented several new models and when you have a number of very popular phones, it naturally affects our sellers. It is not good that only one model or brand is so dominating, we want to sell as much as possible and alternate our campaigns between different manufacturers", says Daniel Lindholm, tmp. market chief at GEAB.
At an other retailer, Dialect, the market chief Anders Hedh is surprised:
"Of course it is not good if one brand dominates, and I have difficulty finding any explanation why it is like that. Both models are good. In our store it could depend on that we right now are running a campaign together with Nokia, which has lead to that they have become a little more in focus in our stores lately", he says.
Translated in a hurry from:
Source: Patrik Holmstr”m, Finanstidningen Swedish Daily Financial Newspaper Online.
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