PageMart Wireless Inc. announced it will give up to two months of free airtime to customers who buy one-way numeric pagers in August at some 17,500 7-Eleven stores nationwide.
7-Eleven stores sell Motorola Pronto Flex numeric pagers for a suggested retail price of about $40, which includes a $20 activation fee. PageMart Wireless provides the pagers and paging service. Customers signing a 12-month service contract receive two months of free airtime, or one month free with a three-month contract.
According to David Swift, vice president of national retail for PageMart Wireless, August marks the one-year anniversary of PageMart offering pagers in convenience stores. 7-Eleven began selling the product in March.
The free promotion comes at a time when paging carriers are under increasing pressure to raise average revenue per unit figures.
Swift said the idea behind the promotion was to attract first-time paging customers by easing the cost of entry. The company hopes to retain those customers and perhaps later migrate them to higher-tier services.
