PHP - get params from AngularJS $http.get request

How does one retrieve the params passed through a $http.get request using PHP?

This is my controller:

app.controller('phonesCtrl', function ($scope, $http, $routeParams) {

    $scope.make = $routeParams.make;
    console.log($routeParams); // Console displays 'Object {make: "apple"}'
    console.log($scope.make); // Console displays 'apple'

    $http({
        method: 'POST',
        url: 'tools/get.php',
        params: $routeParams, // Already an object: "{"make" : apple}"
        headers: {
            'Content-Type': 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded'
        }
    })
    .then(function (response) {
        $scope.phones = response.data;
    });
});

My PHP attempt: works with $http.post, but something tells me I can't use the file_get_contents function to do the same.

<?php

$data = json_decode(file_get_contents("php://input"));

var_dump($data); // Outputs NULL
var_dump($_POST["make"]); // Outputs NULL
var_dump($_POST); // Outputs empty array

$con = new PDO('mysql:host=localhost;dbname=mydb', 'root', 'root');

$stmt = $con->prepare("SELECT * FROM phones WHERE make = ?");
$stmt->bindParam(1, $make);
$stmt->execute();

$result = json_encode($stmt->fetchAll(PDO::FETCH_ASSOC));

print_r($result);

?>

I'm also using the $routeProvider service to keep my links clean. At first I realized the console was outputting blank objects so I changed my config to:

.when('/get/:make', { // Added /:make
    templateUrl: 'tools/get.php',
    controller: 'phonesCtrl'
})

So now my console outputs "apple" when I navigate to /get/apple.