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I won’t change my tune.

I still love my iPhone.

But I think with a premature $200 reduction in the price of the iPhone, Apple has alienated their most loyal consumers, and demonstrated a complete lack of understanding as to why people were willing to trade-up in the first place.

When people stretch and spend more than “they should have” for a luxury item, they find Reasons to Rationalize® their purchase. As for my $600 iPhone, my Reasons to Rationalize included the ability to finally have one stand alone device that allowed me to leave my macbook behind, the iPod functionality, the visual voicemail, etc.  That was how I was able to rationalize spending $600 on a phone.

As of today, I can no longer do that. Now I can rationalize $400 of the purchase to get those features, but Apple has put me in an indefensible position (in my mind) of having spent an extra $200 due to what can only be seen as a completely irrational (or childlike) desire to be first. Essentially I now have paid $400 for a phone, and $200 to have it a few weeks before everyone else. That does not remotely feel good or engender any positive feelings toward the Apple brand.

Another of the key tenets of how you market a trading-up product is how you treat consumers after purchase. After purchase, a purchaser constantly searches for post-purchase cues that they’ve made a smart decision. Up until today, the media/blogosphere was filled with positive reviews all working to reinforce that an iPhone purchase was wise. And then Apple makes a move that completely undoes all of that positive post-purchase feedback in one fell swoop. Now the blogosphere is full of people enraged with their premature purchase.

Net, instead of looking and feeling smart about my iPhone purchase, I feel sheepish for rushing out and not delaying gratification for a few more weeks.

To be clear, I assumed we would see the price drop as the holidays drew near to drive additional iPhone sales, but never in my wildest dreams did I imagine they would cut prices by $200 (with no reduction in features) in 2 months.

The lack of regard for their best customers is really impossible to fathom.

The odds of me ever buying anything in the first 6 months of an Apple new release?  Zero.

Way to go Steve Jobs. You’ve just proved you’re not the “in-touch-with-the-consumer” genius people thought. Apparently you forgot how much your success has depended on riding the backs of millions of misguided Apple evangelists.

There will be one less back to ride in the future.