Maybe the fact that they can schedule you so quickly indicates the demand for the new Hopper/joey system isn't as big as they thought. Who would of thought that in bad economic times like these when gas is going up to $5.00 a gallon , that people aren't wanting to pay more in monthly fees and lose useful features like ota , and pay and arm and a leg to upgrade to it? Oh yeah! I said all that stuff weeks ago when they first leaked the pricing details. Wrong price at the wrong economic time.
Virtually no one knows about the Hopper, what it is, anything, outside forums. And even if they did hear about the Hopper, seriously, the percentage of people who have any idea what a whole home system is or are interested as and existing customer is very low, even with the previous Direct campaign. That will change of course, just as a DVR has become much more known and wanted. I actually think it will be the new customers who will know more about it because when they call to see about getting Dish, they will certainly be directed towards it.
And OTA? As I have posted before, not one person I know with satellite has an antenna for OTA. Must have for me, but I come to the forums and know about it and the benefits. Point is, good or bad economy it takes time for things like this to be known to the general public.
So it's a bad economy. Are you suggesting Dish should not have come out with this? If you are saying the fees will keep it from being sold, I don't agree because I don't agree it will cost much of anything more a month for many/most people. Take the new customer, I'm betting they are not interested in the 722 setup unless they really do need to pay a little as possible. They are going to want HD at two TV's. Two receivers to do that is exactly $1 less for two TV's in HD than the Hopper technology. Yes, that includes the $4 whole house fee.
I keep seeing $99 to get it, the acquisition cost does not seem to me to stand in the way. It is more of people just not knowing about it or understanding it. I have always thought the installs would be new customers, not as much existing ones. Most posts about fees are from existing customers, new customers are going to see it my way - the Hopper will be $1 more for two TV's in HD, and
$2 less for three.
In the end I honestly don't know the demand for whole home, but I sure saw hundreds of posts wondering why Dish doesn't have it and threatening to go to Direct. I guess we shall see.
