Archived Brightspot gets the ax?

[Gravalpea]

Greetings. As I was strolling through my store's breakroom, I couldn't help but notice that in the team lead mail boxes was the information about the electronics transition that is to happen in May for my store. Well, being quite curious, I flipped through it and read that Brightspot is being discontinued and the phones being sent back to T-mobile. I cannot say I am surprised. I am surprised about the no-contract iphones that will be represented with cardboard information like what HBA has for various medicine. What say you? 🙂

 

[oath2order]

Oh right, I forgot Brightspot was a thing

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

I had only sold 1 bright spot, so far. It's real dust collector at my store.

 

[Gravalpea]

I took a picture but here is the text:

Spoiler

Brightspot endcap: program will be discontinued and replaced with Bring your own device (byod).
Brightspot airtime will move inline to support a few additional months of service for guests. Airtime will come down in future revision.

Also: Consumer Cellular will be offering iphone 6 and 6+
Alsoalso: we will be offering prepaid insurance cards with 3 different prices based on handset' reg retail.

 

[Gravalpea]

I had only sold 1 bright spot, so far. It's real dust collector at my store.

The last brightspot phones we sold were the windows phones that went on sale with a steep cut in price and now they won't stop sending them even after the sale is over!

 

[PullMonkey]

I... I use brightspot... 🙁

 

[BoxCutter]

Brightspot, joining Target Ticket on the company's ever growing scrap heap.

 

[BRMember]

Ya... Target ticket was awesome...... Lol

 

[desertcoyote]

Target is pulling back from these programs that we had no business getting into. Saving that b8g money i guess. Reminds me of Kmart in their prime... insurance, real estate and other side business.

 

[Circle9]

I... I use brightspot... 🙁

Same here, I like my service and my Windows phone. Going to be annoyed if I have to find a new provider.

 

[go ahead]

Prepaid is mega competitive now. AT&T has stellar prepaid $45 gets unlimited talk/text and 1gb lte. This same thing for $40 on t-mobile. How can Target compete really? They can't undercut that enough so they scrap it. Plus people like going to more recognizable carriers (like at&t and t-mobile) than brightspot or straight talk.
For me I'd like to get a newer phone on contract but the monthly cost is ridiculous compared to prepaid. I don't mind paying $200 and signing a 2 yr. contract if it was just $45 month but it's not. Ugh.

 

[jenna]

I think I pay $35 a month for Virgin Mobile Prepaid. Happy with the service, so far.

 

[Kartman]

These guys are awesome.

https://www.consumercellular.com/

 

[TeamRed]

My co-worker uses brightspot hmm I wonder what she will do now. She literally just bought that this year too.

 

[BoxCutter]

Virgin Mobile uses the Sprint network. I think Brightspot does, too. I would think Sprint would just take over the service for the phones. Now, how much they would charge is another question. Anybody know if Sprint offers their own prepaid service?

 

[DevinDeLaSpot]

Sprint does offer their own prepaid service. Brightspot is not through Sprint, however. It runs on T-Mobile's network (which also has a prepaid solution of its own, which I assume current Brightspot users will be switched to).

 

[desertcoyote]

Virgin Mobile uses the Sprint network. I think Brightspot does, too. I would think Sprint would just take over the service for the phones. Now, how much they would charge is another question. Anybody know if Sprint offers their own prepaid service?

Brightspot uses T Mobile's network. Which is really hit or miss on service. If you are in good coverage, your speeds are fantastic and on the other end of the spectrum, good luck if you can get 3g speeds...

 

[Bosch]

Brightspot uses T Mobile's network. Which is really hit or miss on service. If you are in good coverage, your speeds are fantastic and on the other end of the spectrum, good luck if you can get 3g speeds...

Coverage depends really on where you live. I have found T-Mobile was awesome in Los Angeles where AT&T not so awesome. Move to a different state and roles reversed. So I found after asking many many people I had to swap carriers to AT&T which has been rock solid.

And Windows phones not going away... I am actually waiting to see what will replace the Nokia 1020...

 

[RightArm]

Also... in case you aren't aware many of the service providers give a discount to Target team members. I get 21% discount through AT&T. I'm not sure what other providers also give discounts but worth looking into.

 

[POGguy]

I know Sprint does and I'm pretty sure Verizon does too. Even if they don't offer it through the website you can try going to the carrier store and they can apply it to your bill.

 

[AllThingsTarget101]

Brightspot was fairly popular at my location. We carry about 10 different phones and usually have about half of them sold out.

 

[MIRSlave]

Goodbye to all the sketchy people that come in trying to buy up all of our stock all the time.

 

[kyle petty]

I will miss our resellers.

"sure, I'll sell you ten..."

 

[sher]

Prepaid is mega competitive now. AT&T has stellar prepaid $45 gets unlimited talk/text and 1gb lte. This same thing for $40 on t-mobile. How can Target compete really? They can't undercut that enough so they scrap it. Plus people like going to more recognizable carriers (like at&t and t-mobile) than brightspot or straight talk.
For me I'd like to get a newer phone on contract but the monthly cost is ridiculous compared to prepaid. I don't mind paying $200 and signing a 2 yr. contract if it was just $45 month but it's not. Ugh.

I buy midrange unlocked phones (google nexus 5 at the moment, moto g previously) full price and use t mobile. If you're not paying for a phone they're non prepaid is only $50 for like 2gb data (before the discount through target). Of course that's only an option if T-Mobile is good in your area. Their prepaid is a little less, but all my music streaming doesn't count against my data limit with the plan so I went postpaid.

I didn't understand why they thought enough people would go with brightspot when regular t-mo is priced similarly and brightspot was so new. I waited years to buy a sodastream because if they failed I wouldn't be able to buy air or whatever lol. I just never buy anything from new companies unless it's something I never have to replenish supplies for.