USA Today reports that cell phone carrier had the opportunity to ink a deal as the sole Apple iPhone service provider contract two years ago but rejected it over financial terms.

Among other things, Apple wanted a percentage of the monthly cellphone fees, say over how and where iPhones could be sold and control of the relationship with iPhone customers, said Jim Gerace, a Verizon Wireless vice president. “We said no. We have nothing bad to say about the Apple iPhone. We just couldn’t reach a deal that was mutually beneficial.”

Apple is notorious for controlling its brand and the “customer experience” that goes with it, once having ended Apple stores-within-stores in large electronics chains because the customer experience was sub par. I don’t blame them; I visited some and they were ghetto.

According to Verizon, Apple CEO Steve Jobs insisted that he have hard control over iPhone distribution.

The problem? While Apple and Verizon stores would have it, Wal-Mart, Best Buy and other Verizon distributors could have been left out. “That would have put our own distribution partners at a disadvantage” to Apple and Verizon stores, Gerace said.

Customer care was another hitch: If an iPhone went haywire, Apple wanted sole discretion over whether to replace or repair the phone. “They would have been stepping in between us and our customers to the point where we would have almost had to take a back seat … on hardware and service support,” Gerace says.

The crown jewel of Apple’s tight control of the customer experience is without a doubt the very successful chain of Apple Stores. Apple in the very early 2000s learned quickly how to sell their products, and the Verizon non-deal makes sense when you look at it from this angle.