Cricket Wireless 2012 Annual Report Download - page 19

Sales and Distribution
Our sales and distribution strategy is designed to increase our market penetration, while minimizing
expenses associated with sales, distribution and marketing, by focusing on improving the sales process for
customers, and by offering easy-to-understand service plans and attractive device pricing and promotions.
We sell our Cricket devices and service through direct and indirect channels of distribution. Our direct
channel is comprised of our own Cricket retail stores. As of December 31, 2012, we had 195 direct locations,
which were responsible for approximately 15% of our gross customer additions in 2012. In addition, we and
third-party retailers also sell Cricket services over the internet.
Our indirect channel consists of our authorized dealers and distributors, including premier dealers and local
market authorized dealers. Premier dealers are independent dealers that sell Cricket products exclusively in stores
that look and function similar to our company-owned stores, enhancing the in-store experience and the level of
customer service and expanding our brand presence within a market. Premier dealers tend to generate
significantly more business than other indirect dealers. As of December 31, 2012, we had approximately 4,350
indirect dealer locations, of which approximately 2,700 were premier dealer locations.
Our indirect channel also includes national retail locations. Beginning in 2011, we began to significantly
expand our nationwide sales presence by offering Cricket products and services in thousands of nationwide retail
locations. Since that time, we have determined to focus our efforts on those retailers that we believe provide the
most attractive opportunities for our business, which currently include Walmart and Radio Shack. As a result, we
expect to reduce our total presence in the nationwide retail channel from approximately 13,000 locations at
June 30, 2012 to approximately 5,000 locations by early 2013. As of December 31, 2012, Cricket products and
services were offered in approximately 8,000 nationwide retail locations. “Top-up” cards for our Cricket
Broadband and Cricket PAYGo services are also available in approximately 4,300 convenience stores and other
indirect outlets.
We are focused on improving the productivity of our distribution system. We strategically select our direct
and indirect retail locations to enable us to focus on our target customer demographic and provide the most
efficient market coverage while minimizing cost. As part of this strategy, we plan to streamline and reduce our
number of direct and indirect dealer locations in 2013 to attempt to increase the productivity of more attractive
locations.
In addition, we are focused on building and maintaining brand awareness in our markets. We combine mass
and local marketing strategies to build brand awareness for Cricket service within the communities we serve. In
order to reach our target segments, we advertise primarily on television, radio and online and also use out-of-
home marketing (such as billboards). We also maintain the Cricket website (www.mycricket.com) for
informational, e-commerce and customer service purposes.
Network Operations and Partnerships
As of December 31, 2012, Cricket service was offered in 48 states and the District of Columbia across an
extended area covering approximately 292 million POPs.
Network Operations
We offer Cricket service, in part, through a network footprint in our operating markets that covered
approximately 96.2 million POPs as of December 31, 2012. We believe our success depends upon utilizing a
network that provides customers with high-quality coverage, capacity and data speeds and that can be readily
upgraded to support enhanced capacity. We have deployed a high-quality network with CDMA2000®1xRTT
(referred to as CDMA 1xRTT) and CDMA2000 1xEV-DO (referred to as EvDO) capability that delivers
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