Sales of the iconic Nokia 3310 were almost three times lower than the market leaders, but some retailers are happy with this / Paul Hanna / Reuters

In July 2017, just under 23,000 Nokia 3310s from Finnish HMD Global were sold in Russia. This follows from materials from a partner of several electronics manufacturers that were made available to Vedomosti, the veracity of which was confirmed by employees of two retail chains. In terms of sales in units, it occupied just over 2% of the push-button phone market. Sales of the leader, Fly FF179, amounted to 78,000 devices, accounting for 7.2% of the market.

Nokia 3310 was initially released in 2000-2005, and 126 million of these devices were sold worldwide. Nokia itself called the 3310 the best-selling phone in the world. In February 2017, at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, HMD Gobal presented an updated version of the device. For developed markets, the release of Nokia 3310 can be considered a kind of PR move, but there is demand here too: it could be in demand as a phone "for entertainment" or a device for information detox, a phone for the weekend, explained HMD President Florian Seiche in a May interview with RBC.

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What does the new Nokia 3310 look like?

Technologies / Photo

The new version of Nokia 3310 has slightly changed in appearance: it has become less angular, slightly smaller in size and noticeably thinner, The Verge noted. The creators promised that the new product will inherit the long battery life that distinguished the original phone - the new product should work 25 days in standby mode, 22 hours in talk mode.

The updated Nokia 3310 went on sale in May at a price of 3990 rubles. In the first days after the device appeared on the Russian market, retail employees interviewed by Vedomosti noted increased demand for the phone and its shortage. Now, however, the opinions of analysts and retailers regarding the first successes of the revived Nokia model in Russia have diverged.

2% of the push-button telephone market is very little, according to Eldar Murtazin, a leading analyst at Mobile Research Group. According to him, Nokia 3310 was unable to make a noticeable impact on the Russian push-button telephone market because the device turned out to be very expensive – several times more expensive than competitors’ devices. The popular push-button Fly costs less than 1,000 rubles, while Nokia costs almost 4,000 rubles.

The share of Nokia 3310 in the MTS retail network is the same as the market share – 0.6%, says its representative Dmitry Solodovnikov. Low sales results confirm that subscribers are becoming less interested in push-button basic models of phones, he believes.

But Svyaznoy, Euroset and M.video are pleased with the sales of the new product. At Svyaznoy, the Nokia 3310 entered the top ten best-selling push-button phones in July 2017, says retailer representative Sergei Tikhonov. At M.video, the model was the clear leader in its price segment of 3,500–4,000 rubles, both in kind and in monetary terms, says M.video representative Valeria Andreeva. The popularity of the device is influenced by the recognizable brand and the memory of the legendary model, Tikhonov and Euroset Purchasing Department Director Alexey Shirokov agree. According to the latter, stable demand for the Nokia 3310 is supported by a good price-quality ratio, and Tikhonov notes the reliability of the model. Such a start after a long absence of the brand in Russia can be considered successful, Tikhonov is sure.

Nokia 3310 reminds us of itself