SINGAPORE -- The haze didn't deter the thousands from camping outside Apple stores overnight across the island before Friday morning's launch of the new
">iPhone 6S.
With air pollution breaching "hazardous" levels of over 300 through Thursday night and into Friday morning, some who had set up for the night along the pavement wore masks as they played cards to pass the time.
The air pollution this morning that people have been camping out under. You have to wonder if it was worth it. pic.twitter.com/gHNRfuOUTN— Victoria Ho (@vickiho) September 24, 2015
Apple doesn't have a direct retail presence here, so the crowds were scattered across various outlets belonging to telcos and official resellers like Epicentre and Nubox.
On Friday morning, one of the people in line outside Epicentre at Wheelock Place, named Gavin, told Mashable he had been to Epicentre's Suntec City outlet, but when he found out there were only 20 sets of the 16GB iPhone 6S sets available, he left. "No reseller wants 16GB ones, and they don't sell as well as the Plus," he said, adding that he was planning to buy a couple of sets to flip for a profit.
People at Suntec also left when they found out about the stock situation at that outlet, he said.
Gavin and his friend Kelvin were at the end of the Epicentre queue and had been there since 10 p.m. the night before.
This is Gavin and Kelvin, they've been in line since last night 10pm. Didn't sleep but looking fresh! #iphone6slive pic.twitter.com/G7DkWTwH0I— Victoria Ho (@vickiho) September 24, 2015
At the head of the line, a group of Vietnamese students had been camping out since 2 a.m. Wednesday. One of them, Lindsay, told us they were keen on buying several sets.
This is Lindsay and her friend, they're at the head of the queue and joined at 2am 2 days ago. pic.twitter.com/l52WVtLqnB— Victoria Ho (@vickiho) September 24, 2015
Epicentre's CEO, Jimmy Fong, told us in the late morning that he expected all his seven stores islandwide to sell out by 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. at the rate that sales were going.
Over at SingTel, one of Singapore's three telcos, queues didn't start as early because all the sales had been completed via pre-orders. Buyers on the SingTel website were given ticket numbers to collect their devices, so they didn't have to stand in line for specific models or colours.
Still, one of its customers Daryl Lee, stood in line at SingTel's Marina Bay Sands outlet from 4:45 a.m. on Friday because he wanted to be the first to get the device.
SingTel said all its 12,000 appointment slots for launch day were filled out, and some models were gone within three minutes of doors opening on Friday.
People stood in line for the rose gold iPhone
Epicentre's stores handed out queue tickets to keep things orderly and offer people an alternative to standing in line outside because of the haze, but many queuing up said they had to anyway because the sets were on a "first come, first served" basis, and they needed to make sure they could get the rose gold sets.
The rose gold iPhone -- a new colour for the device -- is particularly coveted, and many of the sets bought on Friday morning are due to go straight to resellers who plan to flip them for a quick profit in Asian countries like China and Vietnam.
The sets can resell for more than twice the retail price, thanks to consumers hungry to be first to be seen with new iPhones. Naturally, the rose gold makes this statement easier to make. According to the South China Morning Post, the lowest end 16GB iPhone 6S goes for 8,900 RMB to 9,250 RMB (US$1,396 to US$1,450) in China, and the 128 GB iPhone 6S Plus can command as much as 21,000 RMB (US$3,293).
On Thursday night, a group of Vietnamese resellers told us that they had flown in to Singapore and stationed various members of their group across reseller stores along the busy Orchard Road shopping stretch.
We spoke to the reseller, who declined to be named, outside the Somerset 313 store, and she said they were hoping to leave the country with "a few hundred" sets. Epicentre restricts sales to just a set per person, but she shrugged off questions about how the group might achieve its goal.
The overnight queue at 313's Epicentre Apple reseller outlet before tomorrow morning's iPhone 6S launch. pic.twitter.com/XA0LPALUjq— Victoria Ho (@vickiho) September 24, 2015
Vietnam isn't in the first wave of countries to get the iPhone, so there is a window where impatient buyers will pay a premium to get the phone there. China, on the other hand, is part of the first wave, but with sets reportedly sold out within the first 12 hours, Chinese resellers still spy an opportunity there.
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