Just got a disappointing sales email from Apple.



I understand that Apple's just trying to jump in and replace carrier subsidies, but when you email me a deal that sounds like it came from my local car dealership, I begin to worry about your bottom line.

What's the problem? As I have in the heavily edited image, above, I don't like it when you, first, encourage me to trade in a used device without it hitting the open market. That almost always means you're not going to give me what it's worth.

I think I've mentioned how a friend of mine and I have joked that we could just hang out in GameStop and offer anyone in line trading in hardware 50% more than GameStop is going to give them and still make a profit. Similar too is the used car trade-in, where you almost always are taking a least $1000 less than you'd make selling the car yourself on Craigslist or what-have-you.

Second is the move to monthly pricing rather than directly listing a fair price for the item. I know Apple's had a number of financing offers in the past, but it's usually in small blue print under the full price of whatever product you're viewing. I also know that Apple's been able to offload the monthly fee in folks' monthly wireless bill, which is also a little nasty, honestly, because what was really happening is that some percentage of people forgot they were financing their phone with that wireless payment and wouldn't upgrade (or find a cheaper provider) once the phone was paid off. What a scam.

Either way, though, we've got Apple reaching directly for more cash on the table with adverts like this one.

I was originally planning to hold my Apple stock [that I thought I should've sold around $110. What an idiot I am for not doing it], but I don't know now. Not having subsidies might be a bigger deal for the bottom line than I've heard anyone mention.

That is, this ad is dirtier than anything I'd seen from Apple -- "Bring us your trade-ins, and we'll get you financed on the lot!". I guess they're losing their saleshumans that used to do the dirty work, but that doesn't make today's tact any less nasty.

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