On the first of this month, a company called Frontier Communications took over all of Verizon's landline business — including here in West Virginia. Within the state borders, it was a widely-publicized and unpopular takeover.
I'd never heard of Frontier before the takeover. It turns out their customer base is mostly rural and small communities, which means West Virginia is a perfect match for them. Shortly after news of the takeover hit the press, I saw a Frontier phone book laying on the telephone man's desk at my old job. It looked like a cheap magazine and was just about as thick.
A few years ago, there was also a cable company takeover in West Virginia. Charter Communications packed its bags and we ended up with a company called Suddenlink. Suddenlink was formerly known as Cebridge (Classic Communications before that), and their customer base is — you guessed it — mostly smaller and medium-sized communities. Again, a company I'd never heard of.
There's an interesting pattern at work here: Big company decides West Virginia is small potatoes and pulls out, relatively unknown company specializing in small potatoes steps in and scoops up the customers. There are several things we can infer from this pattern.
- Despite any advertising to the contrary, keeping us as customers is secondary to making a profit. Of course that's probably a given for any company, regardless of its size, and regardless of its customer base, but I think it needs to be said nonetheless.
- West Virginia is becoming, or already is, an area which many companies just don't want to deal with. Some parts of West Virginia can't even get service from the small potatoes companies and have to search elsewhere. Radishes, maybe.
- Since our state's population isn't exactly growing, and it hasn't since the days of Ozzie and Harriet, the situation isn't likely to change soon. That also means we're pretty used to it by now. That's neither fortunate nor unfortunate, it merely is what it is.
I really don't mind being "small potatoes" as far as that goes. I still have a dial tone (for whatever that's worth anymore), and I have cable TV and Internet, so I can't complain. I will submit that the landline business in West Virginia is a lost cause regardless of who steps up to the plate. Bell Atlantic and Verizon both let it turn to crud, and we do have these big mountains that you constantly have to work around. When you add the proliferation of cell phones into the mix you've got to wonder what company in its right mind would think, in 2010, scooping up landlines — anywhere — is a good business model.
You know, if we're going to keep flattening the mountaintops to extract the coal underneath, let's make sure to plant some cell towers along with the vegetation when we "reclaim" them.