I really enjoyed Philip Michaels’ post at Macworld yesterday, in which he discussed the success of retail Apple Stores over the years: you hear a lot about Apple Stores opening, but you never hear about them closing again.
When the news first came out that Apple was going to start opening its own chain of retail stores, there were groans from far and wide. “Apple’s a computer company,” the cynics said (myself included). “They’ll never make retail work.”
Oops. On the contrary, Apple has made retail work, and Philip’s post spells out some of the reasons why: Apple has looked to the long term, taking losses in the early days with the expectation that profit will come later. And it has chosen the store locations with great care, picking out high-profile, high-traffic spots that will pull in a very large number of people, lured in by window displays of attractively priced iPods.
A new Apple store opens this Thursday, just up the road from me in Bristol, and it conforms to the rules. It will be located inside the shiny new Cabot Circus development, a vast mall erected where once there was a grimy, dismal 60s shopping area.
As usual, the store’s opening will be marked with hoopla, cheering, and free T-shirts for the first 1000 people through the door. I’m going to go along; not for the T-shirts, but to meet some of those people.
8 responses to “The success of Apple’s retail stores”
“I’m going to go along; not for the T-shirts, but to meet some of those people.”
Might be interesting if you wore your usual Conde Nast standard issue “MacSux” T-Shirt.
Oh, I didn’t realise there was going to be an Apple store. I was planning on coming on down after work on Thursday anyway to see some of the hoop-la and have a look around (I work on Victoria Street); I’ll have to make sure I check it out.
On the other hand, where there once was a grimy, dismal 60s shopping area appears to be a shiny new, erm, 60s shopping area. Certainly from driving past it it doesn’t look much changed to me, and it’s still the same “welcome to Bristol, here are some dull boxy concrete buildings” feeling at the bottom of the M32. I’m not terribly impressed so far.
I can’t help but imagine that once the initial circus of opening funkiness has packed away and gone home, we’re going to be left with a bland corporate shopping centre the same as everyone else has got. Not a terrible thing, but not a great one, either.
zato3: mine doesn’t fit me anymore. I’ll stick with my Daring Fireball shirt, I think.
Matt: completely agree with you about the architecture. It’s just as grim as the thing it replaced, only taller. And more expensive.
I didn’t “get” the Apple store in the beginning. As someone in retail for 16 years it just didn’t make sense. The flow was odd, almost freeform. It didn’t seem to drive customers to specific area or products in the store. The help was so unobtrusive they seemed standoffish. Customers were actually “supporting” customers.
But it worked (duh). Apple gave the stores time to mature. The customers who helped were the evangelists. Subtly, the staff watched this, and then seemed to know when to enter the conversation. I’m assume that these new customers then brought more customers, until it reached critical mass, and now the staff is the first contact. They moved the Genius Bar (in my store) from the side to the back, so it’s in the background when you enter the store. The even move the location of the computers regularly, which exposes you to different products each time you play with your coveted “next Mac.” It’s an amazing model. It makes me wonder if it grew organically or if it was the plan all along?
As Wired magazine’s April cover about Apple put it “evil/genius”