iPhone 4 Toronto launch report with video and pictures

RGB Filter was at the Toronto launch of the iPhone 4 on Friday, July 30th. However not being a die-hard Apple fanatic I wasn’t lining up for the phone myself, so I slept in and missed the 7 AM early opening at the Apple Store.

When I got to the Eaton Centre, at about 7.30 AM, there was a short line outside the Bell store, waiting for that store’s 10 AM opening, a pretty long line outside Fido, and a few people outside the Rogers store. Most amusing to me was that Telus had opened their store at 7 AM too, which I and any potential customers were unaware they were doing, since they didn’t announce this beforehand! When I ask one of the Telus employees how busy it had been he told me that they had only had a couple customers buying iPhone 4’s. Along with no announcement of any kind of data promo, until later in the day, it’s not hard to see why Telus is probably the least used of all the carriers who sell the iPhone in Canada.

It wasn’t until I went upstairs to the Apple store that I understood the magnitude of interest in the iPhone 4. Prior to the launch I had speculated with the negative cloud cast by ‘antennagate’, and the wider selection of good high-end Android smartphones available in Canada now, that the line-up wouldn’t be that long.

Boy was I wrong.

It stretched half-way down the mall, then wrapped around the other side! Apple had their friendly, enthusiastic (over?) employees giving out coffee, and answering any questions the people in line had, and they were taking people to the front that were looking to just buy an unlocked iPhone 4, so they could process their purchase quickly, and have them activate it at home.

For people looking to upgrade their existing phone, or sign a new contract, the wait was a lot longer, the first customer in-line didn’t get out until around 9 AM! Keep in mind he had been there since noon the previous day, so including activation time, he waited in-line for his iPhone 4 for 21 hrs! I was amused when he came out the store with his iPhone 4 and was mobbed by the media, since one of the first things he did was hold the phone in the ‘death-grip’, and showed the signal bars to the cameras, to try and debunk ‘antennagate’.

I also did an informal poll of the line — the majority of people were existing iPhone users upgrading to the new phone, and most of them were on Fido or Rogers. Since both Bell and Telus customers wouldn’t qualify for similar aggressive upgrade promos as Rogers, I don’t think many of them were willing to pay full price for the iPhone 4. Even worse for Telus I couldn’t find one person in line using Telus, or looking to sign-up for a new iPhone 4 on Telus. Maybe they should have announced their 5GB bonus data plan the day before!

I also went outside the mall to the Rogers store on Yonge, just north of Dundas, where there were about 50 people in line too, but a helpful sign with stock levels at the store showed that not all of them would get phones. It does seem though that if you showed up early enough at stores like The Telephone Booth, Wireless Wave, Rogers, and Fido, you stood a much better chance of getting your phone quickly, without lining up for hours. However their stock quickly ran out, so by lunch time the only people left guaranteed the phone were the people still lining up outside Apple. When I returned in the evening, to find people still there, even Apple had run out of phones.

Overall the Canadian iPhone 4 launch day was a success for Apple — there were much more people in line than were in the 3GS line, and with reports of people still lining up outside Apple stores each morning a week later, Apple must feel vindicated after all the bad publicity that the antenna issues generated.

It will be interesting to see however how long the momentum lasts, because I think now for every iPhone fan there is probably two people looking at a competing smart-phone. With the Bell Galaxy S Vibrant and Telus HTC Desire out now, the Canadian smartphone landscape has just got very interesting.

Video and pictures from the launch