KING SOOPERS BOOSTS CELLULAR SALES

JOEL ELSON

DENVER -- King Soopers has stimulated cellular telephone sales by displaying a working model customers can test before buying.

According to one company official who wished to remain anonymous, the 8-foot, front-end, cellular telephone display, is located at "guest service centers." There, shoppers can use a display telephone to call an air carrier company that is working with King Soopers to help prospective phone buyers "in selecting a phone, arranging an airtime package and getting help with credit approval," according to a store source.

Customers who arrange airtime through the display phone display phone and who work with the air carrier selected by King Soopers receive a discount on their cellular telephone purchase.

For example, the food chain's best seller among its 15 or so different cellular telephones offered is a Motorola DPC 550 flip model at $49.99, said the store source. Without signing up with an air carrier, however, the phone retails at $349, the source added.

Some stores began selling about 20 phones a month after the chain began putting in the phone displays last Christmas, resulting in a positive effect on telephone sales chainwide. Previously, King Soopers had a regular telephone at the courtesy counter also connected to the air carrier, but the sales boom did not begin until an actual working cellular phone went on display, said the source.

"Now, anyone interested in cellular phones and how they work can use the display model," said the source. The source explained King Soopers has attempted to make ordering a cellular telephone a fairly simple matter by providing easy-to-follow instructions, with a ready supply of products on hand at the service desk when the transaction is completed.

Sales of cellular telephones, which retail up to $89.99, and pagers vary by store location and shopper demographics at King Soopers.

This is "a convenient way for customers to buy a phone and arrange for the carrier airtime," explained the company official.