T-Mobile US will no longer stock BlackBerry in store, moves to shipping direct to customers

Over the past little while, there has been a few threads pop up in the CrackBerry Forums from folks stating that their local T-Mobile stores were no longer carrying BlackBerry smartphones. For the most part, it was assumed to just be a regional thing but according to Reuters and David Carey, Executive Vice President for Corporate Services, T-Mobile, it's more of a chain wide initiative.

Carey said that "keeping stock in the retail distribution system was inefficient" because BlackBerry phones have not been high demand devices for consumers.

He said BlackBerry smartphones are mostly purchased by businesses who do not make buying decisions in stores.

"Therefore we will display and sell it in the store for those consumers who would like to see one," he added.

Obviously, that news isn't exactly the best for BlackBerry but it's not entirely unheard of either. Sprint has been doing the same thing with BlackBerry Q10 in most of their retail locations since they released the device and with BlackBerry announcing their move into the prosumer market, I'm sure this won't be the last time we hear of carriers taking this approach when selling BlackBerry smartphones.

To be clear, you'll still be able to get a BlackBerry smartphone from T-Mobile, you'll just have to order it online or go to a store and tell them you want one, so that they can ship it out to you directly. Slightly less convenient for you and less chance someone might buy a BlackBerry smartphone on a whim or after having seen what it is capable of.