PhoneNews.com has contacted several Best Buy retail stores, and has confirmed that the company discontinued its semi-official pre-order campaign.
Though never promoted fully by Best Buy, the company was taking names during a five day period to hold units of Droid X phones for upgrade and new activations. Best Buy is an attractive option for customers, as it does not require mail-in rebates to upgrade devices.
However, the tactic may have been done in concert with Verizon and Motorola to generate hype for the device. Stores reported to PhoneNews.com that they expected to receive more units than they took pre-orders for, while a few stores reported that they would at least receive enough units to satisfy all pre-orders taken.
Stores would not disclose the amount of pre-orders, but did report that no contact was made to take count of pre-orders company-wide. This indicates that the five day campaign was based on generating hype, rather than limited based on quantity.
In the era of stealth and viral marketing campaigns, manufacturers are now resorting to offering devices in limited fashion to gain interest and hype. The psychological effect of not being able to obtain something creates interest, and can have powerful marketing benefits. The Droid X pre-order campaign may prove a powerful test of if this is possible.
Apple confirmed last month that iPhone 4 pre-orders were sold out, despite having a supply of units available at launch and quickly thereafter in resupply shipments. The company is however now suffering from a backorder of the white iPhone 4 variant.
