After the initial demand surge at product release, is supply really that constrained? istocknow.com shows the iphone 6 is currently widely available in the US. If they're not in short supply in stores, why not save some $15 million?
Sitting in a cargo container in the middle of the Pacific vs the back room of a store for 30 days doesn't seem that different to me.
The watch, however, is sold out until July, if not later for some models, so it would make sense to ship them by air.
Those aren't the only choices. You can simply manufacture them 25 days later, and owe your suppliers 25 days later as well. I'm sure Apple tracks and manages their stock as well if not better than anyone in the business. It helps that their product line is so slim.
I doubt there is 30 days of phone inventory, more like 1-2 weeks. They are keeping their supply below 4 weeks, as part of lean manufacturing. Thus their turnover in supply is less than the amount of time it takes for a shipment to cross the ocean.
This might still be doable, but demand shifts would mean that some models that are suddenly more popular (Eg: the white vs gold colors) would cause outages.
The goal is zero supply- the phone arrives at the store just as the customer spontaneously walks in to buy it.
According to their most recent investor conference call, they are at about 5 weeks of channel inventory for iPhones. (Essentially at the low end of the range that they said that they want to be in)
Sitting in a cargo container in the middle of the Pacific vs the back room of a store for 30 days doesn't seem that different to me.
The watch, however, is sold out until July, if not later for some models, so it would make sense to ship them by air.