How do I format a PHP array for use with AngularJS' ng-repeat directive?

I have a table that I want to populate using ng-repeat. I'm having trouble figuring out how to format my array so that it works. Here is what I have so far:

PHP (customers.php):

$customer_array = array();

$customer1 = array(
  'customer_id' => '1',
  'name' => 'John Doe',
  'city' => 'New York'
);
$customer_array[] = $customer1;

$customer2 = array(
  'customer_id' => '2',
  'name' => 'Jane Doe',
  'city' => 'Boston'
);
$customer_array[] = $customer2;

echo($customer_array);

AngularJS Controller (CustomersCtrl.js):

$http({
    url: 'customers.php',
    method: "POST"
})
.success(function (data, status) {
    $scope.customers = data;
})
.error(function (data, status) {
    $scope.status = status;
});

HTML:

<table>
<tbody ng-controller="CustomersCtrl">
    <tr ng-repeat="customer in customers">
        <td>{{customer.customer_id}}</td>
        <td>{{customer.name}}</td>
        <td>{{customer.city}}</td>
    </tr>
</tbody>
</table>

This isn't working. What am I doing wrong?

UPDATE: I'm wondering if this is because I'm loading the HTML code from above using the code below:

$routeProvider.when('/customers.php', {
    templateUrl: 'partials/customers.html',
    controller: 'CustomersCtrl'
});

Is it because the newly loaded html template is not bound to the controller before it tries to do the ng-repeat loop?