We've debated the issue of restaurants and coffee shops offering paid for WiFi and how it may or may not bring in business. Around the middle of the month we told you about
McDonalds new WiFi strategy and how it seemed a bit dead before it even got started. Now, we hear that some of the pioneers of the paid for WiFi (Starbucks and T-Mobile) are not doing so well either.
Ars Tecnica has a blurb about how T-Mobile is only making about $13 per Hotspot per day!
"That is likely way less than T-Mobile is forking out for the T-1s running into each store on top of other operational expenditures. That is the primary (and possibly fatal) weakness of the for-pay 802.11b/g business model. With the number of free sites on the rise, paying US$6.00 per hour or US$29.95 per month to surf while drinking your four-dollar cup of coffee is not an attractive value proposition, even when two such strong brands are throwing their weight behind the concept. If you really need to sate your caffeine and Internet jones, you are better off finding a place with free WiFi, or at the very least, showing up at Starbucks with a tripod and Pringles can."
Personally, I am surprised by this finding. I thought if anyone would be better suited for paid WiFi it would be a large coffee house chain. After all, it would be great to sit back with a large cup of joe and surf the morning away on your Pocket PC....Wait! I can do that from home!
Any comments?