Ad Age reports on moves being made by telecommunications executives to consolidate their offererings under one extremely well known banner.
AT&T announced it will accelerate the elimination of its Cingular Wireless brand by removing the name from all in-store signage, including kiosks and point-of-sale materials in 1,800 company-owned stores. Several high-profile stores in major markets will have new AT&T signs. Over the next few months, branding in arenas such as consumer touch points, handset logos and Nascar sponsorship also will be changed.
In this new world of big bundles, “it makes sense to make everything under one name,” said Jeff Kagan, a wireless analyst briefed on the changes by AT&T. Mr. Kagan said he expects over the next few years that 40% of the nation’s telecom customers will have bundles with a traditional phone carrier and 40% to have bundles with cable carriers.
Meanwhile, AT&T has said it has more than 1 million prospective iPhone customers who have signed up for information about the Apple phone when it launches. Apple’s Steve Jobs has said he expects to sell 10 million iPhones, all presumably customers of AT&T.
