Protection RacketAre cell phone covers, films, and jackets worth the money?
Posted Friday, Dec. 4, 2009, at 7:07 AM ET
The thrill of taking a Motorola Droid or iPhone 3GS out of the box comes with a measure of anxiety. This phone, so perfect and so pure—in your clumsy, sweaty hands. How will you keep it safe? What if your precious gets scratched, or scuffed, or broken?
Don't worry—there's a product just for you. Actually, if you're shopping at the Apple Store, there are 143 products: hard plastic sliders, striped cotton iPod socks, textured skins, scratch-proof films, titanium jackets, branded silicone covers, precision-stitched folios, and phone wallets made of fine Italian leather. A survey conducted in July found that 40 percent of U.S. wireless customers have carrying cases for their phones, as a bulwark against bumps, scratches, and dust. Some models claim more extravagant benefits: resilience to extreme temperatures, for example, or "antimicrobial protection" (lest your phone sprout mold or decompose). In September, Pong unveiled a silicone iPhone protector that wards off nicks as it "redirects radiation away from your head."
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StumbleUponMost cases run $30 or $40—about one-fifth the cost of a top-notch smartphone—but fancier versions are available. According to Michael Morgan of ABI Research, the global market for "carrying accessories"—a category that includes belt-clip holsters, leather sleeves, and silicone sheaths, among other products—has grown to $2.1 billion per year. But it's not clear how much protection you get for the money. Hooman Morvarid, proprietor of the phone repair company CellularDR.com, says there's not much chance that dust will plug up your charge port or headphone jack. (If it does, just spritz it with an air can.) A well-made case may help prevent a glass touch screen from breaking, but Morvarid thinks that's not the main thing owners should be worrying about. The most common problem for any cell phone is water damage—from drops in the toilet, spilled drinks, ear sweat in the speaker holes, etc. When it comes to aqueous cell phone catastrophes, a standard case offers no protection at all.
So, what's the point of these protective covers? If you've laid out for one of those smartphones with the black chrome bezel and the glossy face, the form of your device is likely as important as its function. Rubber sheaths and plastic films promise to sustain a gadget's gleaming curves right out of the box. Apple consumers have shown a particular obsession with aesthetics: In 2005, fanboy mobs decried the first-generation iPod nano for its tendency to get scratched and scuffed. After Wall Street Journal tech guru Walt Mossberg joined in the complaining—"my recommendation now is that nano owners must buy and use a case for the device. … I don't consider it optional"—a class-action lawsuit was filed. Apple agreed to a $22.5 million settlement this past January, with payouts to all those who "experienced scratching … that impaired your use or enjoyment of your iPod nano."
If scratches can impair one's enjoyment of a shiny gizmo, then what about a case made of bulky rubber? Manufacturers say the cases are "sleek" and "form-fitting." No, they're thick and ugly. This raises an obvious question: Even if carrying accessories do preserve a gadget's tender frame, so what? No one can admire your iPhone's unblemished skin when it's sheathed in the tread of a car tire. Since covered phones can't be admired by anyone but their owners, there must be some unspoken pleasure in the idea that you—and you alone—can lift that burqa of molded silicone.
Our fetish for virgin phones has spun off into a series of disturbing YouTube clips—not so much gadget porn as gadget S&M. In these homemade vids, anonymous men subject their delicate flowers to the most brutal degradation. A teenager jabs his touch screen with a 2-inch blade. A shadowy Eastern European tries to smash his phone with a Phillips-head screwdriver. These vignettes always end the same way: The key scrapes across the glass … and the gadget emerges unscathed. High-end phones—or at least their screens—appear to be stupendously resilient.
Nevertheless, screen protectors and phone cases have been around for as long as we've been making mobile calls. In the early days, we kept our cellulars in leather cases with wrist straps: They were status symbols, to be dangled like jewelry or tucked inside a briefcase. By the mid-1990s, carrying cases were earning a 45 percent profit margin for manufacturers, compared with 12 percent or 15 percent for mobile hardware. Clinton-era tech columnists were wary of the new industry's cash cow: "Some retailers push expensive carrying cases," warned the San Francisco Chronicle in 1995. "Don't bother. It's just as easy to stick them in your briefcase or purse." In 1998, the Cleveland Plain Dealer advised stuffing your ears to "the siren call of … leatherette carrying cases (an old eyeglass case works just fine for most phones)."
The craze for cases seems to have fallen off somewhat in the early 2000s (although it's hard to know for sure). Cell phones got cheaper and more widespread, and their customer base grew beyond a narrow class of leather-toting executives. More importantly, the phones themselves began to change. The success of the Motorola RAZR—which debuted in time for Christmas 2004—marked the heyday of the clamshell flip phone. Now each handset comprised two parts, an inside and an outside. With the device snapped shut, its screen and buttons were naturally protected, and a little wear-and-tear on the husk was no big deal.
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Phone covers are a pretty useful thing for me. A few weeks ago, I left my phone sitting on a plastic box, where my HORSE could reach it. (Horse was tied, loosely, and I was fetching a brush or something.) I walked back toward horse to see her pick it up with her mouth and then drop it on the concrete barn floor.(Thank god she didn't eat it, oh lordee what a vet bill that would be.)
My Razor wouldn't have survived that adventure had it not been in it's nice little leather wallet-like cover. I can't imagine keeping nearly any modern phone without one.
-- lorikay4
(To reply, click here)
I'm not sure any of the cases are guaranteed to make your phone horse-proof. Nor can we be sure that your phone wouldn't have survived the fall without a case. But you're right: It does seem like you'd want to invest in a rugged phone, or a sturdy case, if there's the possibility that a large mammal might bite your gadget.
-- Daniel Engber
(To reply, click here)
Quibble: the best smart phones cost more than five times the cost of a case. While a Droid or iPhone may cost only $200 from the carrier, if you break one and need to replace it, without insurance, the cost is closer to $600. That's almost 20 times the cost of some cases.
I have a Droid. From Day 1, I wanted a case that the unit could slide in and out of--a pouch. There are no cases like that for the Droid. There are cases like that for the iPhone, but the Droid is just enough bigger that an iPhone case barely fits, and forget about sliding the unit in and out.
There is a "leather" case with a snap, for wearing on the belt. No thanks. There are rubber gizmos that fit around the edges of the unit, but hey ruin the aesthetics.
I found a faux leather case for an old calculator. It was something I already had, that I made shorter by cutting part off. It holds the Droid and a cloth for wiping off the screen, and it fits in my pocket. I only wish it were a little sleeker--like if it were made by Dunhill.
-- jimstoic
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That's a valid point about the retail cost of these phones. But still-- how many people buy these devices retail? My phone has a little crack in it, but I'll hang on to it until I'm ready to get a new phone anyway. This market tends to run on a 18 to 36 month cycle, so people will be upgrading every couple of years anyway-- to a new carrier-subsidized phone.
-- Daniel Engber
(To reply, click here)