How do the iphone lines work at malls?

[jimmyrules712]

I might go to the apple store in a nearby mall tomorrow morning to try to get a phone.

The store opens at 10am when the mall opens. Will there just be a line of people outside the mall?

[Basement06]

I hate to sound negative about it, but it basically depends on your location. The only way to know for certain is by calling ahead, checking the apple.com website at 9pm or being there when they open.

Bottom line: yes, there will likely be lines for the next couple weeks

[nobopyon]

If I were you, I would go maybe 30 min before the apple store open with a cup of coffee...

Usually, a typical mall, they open 9am (could be earlier 8am, because some some store such as salon open at 9am, so the building itself has to be open for employee to get in).

[projectdarkside]

Well since this isnt an official "camp/wait" they're wont be the "usual" tape fences, with the security guards and lawn chairs sooo....:smile:
-Like the post above says the mall must first be open for employees to get in, so I would recommend just waiting outside like maybe 30min before with some breakfast and coffee and some other things to make those 30min go by faster ya kno:wink:

Good Luck:laugh2:

[Londonrockz568]

Basically I called the nearest apple store asking them how long the wait was. He told me about 1hour 30min so I drove to the store saw a tiny line and waited. About an hour later I got my iPhone.

The best way to go about getting the phone is actually going on the apple site and looking at what iPhones are in stock, after that try calling to find out how long the wait or line is. Don't bother asking them how many they have left b/c they are told not to say. Just get out there early or go during the week during rush hour. I went at like 4:30 in the day and got my phone by about 5:45 acivation process and all.

[Romanesq]

Unfortunately the Apple Retail site has not always been correct. And people have gone to malls and such gotten in line only to find out the Apple Store does not have any available.

But there seems to be shipments daily to many Apple Stores. So you basically can try to call and see if they are receiving shipments daily and then decide when to go. If you go early as in a mall that opens its doors early, then you can also get over to the Apple Store and line up before it opens.

I got lucky and went to a mall and it was officially open at 10:00 am but I walked in about 10 to and when I got to the Apple Store there were less than 20 people ahead of me. Since is was last Saturday and the first weekend day and they had Friday already under their belt, they had plenty of people ready with their mobile gadgets to move things ahead.

It was not even 20 minutes before I was in the store with a phone. 16GB of pure love.

[eye-Fone]

This past Thursday (six days after iDay), I went to buy an iPhone 3G. I got to the mall and waited in line (outside) at 7:15 a.m. for a 9:00 opening. I was 23rd in line. As the opening hour approached, the line grew to about 100 people.

I came to this location (Manhattan Village Mall, in Manhattan Beach, California) because the night before, the availability web site said they had all models in stock. Closer to my home (Orange County), most Apple stores were sold out of the 16GB models, both black and white)

When I finally got to the "front" of the line, by the mall entrance, the Apple guy stamped our hands--just 10 of us at a time would get stamped. After a little while, he let us "stamped folks" into the mall and told us to go around the corner to the Apple store. Well, the Apple store had a roped-off line in front (outside in the hall), where no more than 10 people would stand.

So, I made it from the long, main, outdoor line to the smaller indoor line. We waited for quite a while until he let three of us in the store into a "holding area". This area was a cordoned-off section of the store with display iPods and macbooks for us to play with while we waited more. We waited, again, for quite a while. Every so often, an employee would come up to this special area and take one person over to buy the iPhone.

My whole ordeal with waiting in line and buying the phone was four hours. When the employee finally came to get me, the whole "pick-the-phone-and-pay-for-it-and-activate-it" process took less than 15 minutes and I was out of there with a brand new 16GB white iPhone 3G.

While walking back out of the mall, past the outdoor line, there were still 80-90 people in line. This was just after 11:00 a.m.