While 2020 was a challenging year, it could have ended on a worse note for the mobile device ecosystem of carriers, OEMs, and retailers. The slowdown in retail sales in Q1 and Q2, began to improve in Q3, and according to research from Counterpoint, new smartphone sales rose 8% in 4Q over the previous quarter. And, because trade-ins and new phone sales are tightly intertwined, we saw similar trends when analyzing our Mobile Device Trade-In Data.

Here at HYLA Mobile, an Assurant company, we usually expect a flurry of activity from about August through the end of the year as OEMs begin to unveil their new flagship phones. There are promotions around the launches and also for the holiday shopping season. We then see the activity flatten out dramatically after the end of the year as many promotions go away.

Here’s the thing—it is still a very good time to purchase a new phone. First of all, major carriers and OEMs are extending their usual holiday deals into the new year—something that we typically haven’t seen before. Customers should definitely take advantage of this now before the deals expire.

Second, those hungering for the newest and best technology still have an appreciable opportunity whether they prefer iPhones or Android phones. Apple released their latest devices just three months ago and Samsung just introduced their latest smartphones.

Samsung’s latest 5G devices; the Galaxy S21 and S21+, and S21 Ultra; boasts a super high-resolution camera, their fastest processor yet, and improved battery life.

Here at HYLA Mobile, an Assurant company, we offer a white-labeled customer service function for our trade-in services. In other words, if a customer contacts one of our customers (carrier, retailer, OEM) with a question about the phone they just traded in, that question gets seamlessly shunted in our direction.

Our support is offered via phone, chat, and email, and many if not most of our support requests are received online. In fact, the number of support queries we receive via the internet is very large and continues to grow, which could lead to a problem with scale.

When consumers embark on the quest to trade-in their mobile phone, they face a multitude of options regarding where and how to conduct their trade.  All trade-in programs strive to create a very simple experience for this consumer, and they all have many points in common – the customer hands over their old device, the cosmetic & functional condition is verified, and the customer receives payment in return, either in the form of store credit, gift card, or bill credits.  

Specific dates in the calendar are imperative for the sale of new devices. Christmas has been a staple for years now and Black Friday has become another opportunity to encourage consumers to upgrade to the latest and greatest smartphone.

Apple’s recent iPhone 12 event was significant for the smartphone and secondary device market—and not just because Apple launched its first set of 5G devices—but because of the focus Apple placed on trade-ins. In fact, it was the only ancillary offering that was mentioned at any point during the event. 

Each quarter, we analyze the millions of data points we’ve acquired and filtered regarding the mobile device trade-in market. We examine the most-traded devices, total amount of money returned to U.S. consumers, average value of traded devices and more. This quarter we have added trade-in value of wearables to the mix of data we share.

Assessing pre-owned smartphones manually is not easy nor efficient. First, there’s a problem of scale—massive amounts of trade-ins are conducted every year. Here at HYLA, we processed 3 million pre-owned phones in 2019, which amounts to over 10,000 phones per day. Hiring the number of workers needed to assess these phones purely by hand would be cost-prohibitive, especially since some of these phones aren’t able to return much value other than the cost of their recycled raw materials.

Each quarter, we analyze millions of data points about the mobile device trade-in market. Our research uncovers insights into the most-traded devices, the devices with the highest trade-in values, the total amount of money returned to consumers in the United States, the average value of traded devices, and more.

The effort to manufacture and sell smartphones is a truly global effort. From design to sale, one can expect a smartphone to have already traveled halfway around the world, which in recent months, has been an impossibility for people, let alone smartphones.