Our third mobile carrier doesn’t launch until Wednesday. But its big reveal, scheduled for tomorrow, has been undermined by a couple of retailers who are a little too quick off the mark.

Rather than launch with its own stores (although those are promised later), 2degrees will rely on service stations, supermarkets and other retail partners, who between them will provide 1700 outlets stocking the companies phones and SIM cards.

Pre-pay focus
IDC analyst Rosalie Nelson has said the lack of direct retail presence indicates 2degrees’ won’t have a focus on 12 or 24-month contracts, and associated high-end, subsidised handsets - simply for the fact that most customers would want to sit down and discuss such a deal. But at a Foodtown, there’s nowhere to sit, and in any case no dedicated sales rep.

A 2degrees insider has also pointed towards a pre-pay focus, with comments that the pre-pay is growing in the US, filling a role as a “recession buster”.

$2 sim cards, with $2 air time loaded
Progressive, owner of the Countdown, Foodtown and Woolworths chains that will carry 2degrees stock, has already put a 2degrees sim card on its Foodtown.co.nz/Woolworths.co.nz shopping site, for $2.

The site lists no details about how to transfer a Vodafone handset to a 2degrees sim card.

But NBR has already obtained a sim card from a second 2degrees retail partner, Dick Smith.

The sim card comes in a pack that tells you to dial 200 and follow prompts to get set-up, or to go to 2degreesmobile.co.nz/transfer (a section of the operator’s site that returned only error messages when NBR checked in).

There are also prompts for topping up your sim card via credit card. There is also a store locator site for pre-pay top-ups (2degreesmobile.co.nz/topup).

A third retail partner, Warehouse Stationery, offers the most details.

A flyer from the chain reveals several handsets in 2degrees’ range, indicating a focus toward the lower end of the market.

The flagship offer - also name-checked in Warehouse Stationery ads on TV last night, then picked up by the Geekzone crew - is a Nokia 1202 for $79.

The flyer also offers the following handsets for 2degrees sim card buyers:
Samsung Crest E1100T: $99
Nokia 5030: $129
Nokia 2700: $249 (with as $10.92 weekly payment option)
Nokia E63: $649 (with a $8.77 weekly payment option).

One Geekzone member derisively labels all the handsets, bar the E63, as "stoner phones".

The Nokia E63 costs $699 if bought off-plan from Vodafone, whose handsets share the same 900MHz frequency as 2degrees; Telecom XT uses 850MHz.

Vodafone's Nokia does not stop there, however. It also includes several more upscale models, such as the E75 ($1249) and the N97 $1799. Telecom also carries the E75. Such higher-end handsets are part of Vodafone and Telecom’s efforts to nudge more of their customers off pre-pay and onto higher yielding contracts (although Vodafone is also covering the lower end of the market with a revamped $18.95 a month plan).

Like Dick Smith and Progressive, Warehouse Stationary is selling 2degrees sim cards for $2 (with $2 air time loaded). It also adds a second option, with $20 buying you a sim with $20 air time loaded.

A flyer, already online, says the chain will offer $20 and $100 2degrees pre-pay vouchers.

Many details still need to be filled in, such as just how much talk-time, txt or data a $20 or $100 pre-pay might buy.

And 2degrees could still include contract plans as part of its mix, along with higher-end handsets.

But from everything sighted so far, analysts and rivals' predictions about a focus on pre-pay, and the lower end of the market, seem on-target.

Watch, however, for a move upscale as 2degrees moves on from its launch.

New boss Eric Hertz told NBR "this is a race, not a sprint." A direct retail presence will follow down the track, along with a focus on smartphones data cards, netbooks and other higher end devices as part of Mr Hertz' vision of 500% market penetration.