"Starbucks announced it had T-Mobile Wi-Fi installed in more than 3,100 U.S. cafes. Starbucks recognizes that the Wi-Fi service has helped the company retain customers longer and at off-peak hours. Wi-Fi users visit Starbucks locations an average of eight times a month, are online for approximately an hour, and arrive after the morning rush. There are currently more than 4,700 HotSpot locations throughout the U.S. (Source: IT Web) "
Considering that T-Mobile WiFi service is a paid service (and its not cheap), the fact that Starbucks is seeing benefits from offering it, suggests that there exists some kind of a business model in offering WiFi. I haven't seen any numbers from locations that offer free WiFi though, I wonder if the effect is the same.
Living in Oregon, its nice to be able to find a zillion locations with free WiFi. I am sure there are some numbers available on the business impact of this service since all the coffeeshops that offer it are not chains, and focus on building a community of a sort. On the other hand, one has to KNOW that there is free wifi at a particular coffeeshop, while with Starbucks, you know they have T-Mobile (or are at least more likely to have it). Just how much of that use is accounted by travellers, I wonder?
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