Sprint Opening For Business Inside 1,435 RadioShack Stores Today

A rendering of what the new SprintShack store branding could look like.

Things move fast when you’re in the newlywed phase, and Sprint is no exception: Only a few weeks after Standard General acquired 1,740 RadioShack stores at a bankruptcy auction, Sprint will be opening stores inside 1,435 RadioShack locations today. Soon, those stores will bear new co-branded Sprint-RadioShack signage.

The move will more than double Sprint’s retail locations, the company says in a press release. No existing Sprint stores will be closed, a spokesman tells FierceWireless, “since we picked these locations based on among other things our existing store footprint.”

Before teaming up with RadioShack, Sprint had about 1,100 company-owned retail stores, compared to AT&T’s more than 2,000 retail locations and Verizon Wireless’ roughly 1,700 stores (not including a large amount of other dealers).

This won’t necessarily mean every single Radio Shack store slated for change will get a Sprint makeover today. Instead, Sprint is planning to have that done in the second half of the year.

“The rebranding and build-out of the store-in-a-store concept will take some time to be complete in all the stores and we will be doing that in waves,” a Sprint spokesman Scott Sloat told FierceWireless.

The stores-within-the-stores will take up about 1/3 of each location’s footprint, where Sprint’s retail employees will sell phones and service. Sprint is paying for overhead costs, distribute commission on its merchandise and pitch in with advertising. At most of those co-branded stores, Sprint’s logo will be more prominent than RadioShack’s.

Sprint set to open 1,435 co-branded locations with RadioShack tomorrow [FierceWireless]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist