We still don’t know the exact date the Apple Watch will ship, but a new rumor claims you won’t be able to pick one up at BestBuy, Walmart, or other non-Apple Stores at launch.
Apple plans to make its timepiece an Apple Store exclusive, according to German distribution sources who claim resellers will be shut out so Cupertino can suck up as much Apple Watch profits in the first year as possible.
While many of us will be celebrating Valentine’s Day this Saturday, for Apple it represents the end of an era.
At 10pm today, Apple will close its existing Oakridge retail store in San Jose, California — with a new, larger one set to open Saturday morning at 10am. In the process, Apple will have marked the end of its mini-store experiment, with the Oakridge venue being the last of its kind.
First launched in 2004, Apple’s mini-stores were an effort to quickly roll out new Apple Stores to keep up with demand at a time when the company was unable to find enough of the larger sites it was looking for. Nine mini-stores were opened in all — ranging in size from 2,000-square-feet down to a tiny 500-square foot.
It looks like we might be witnessing the end of an era. Apple is apparently taking down the iconic atom symbol signs from behind the Genius Bars of many of their Apple Stores, removing one of the most whimsical and fun branding elements from their retail presence.
In my experience, Apple Store employees are some of the hardest-working, most reasonable and (despite the fact they’re employed to sell you things) trustworthy people in retail. According to Manhattan district attorney, however, that description isn’t universal.
The DA is indicting four former Apple Store employees, plus a dental office receptionist, for an Apple-related scam that ultimately defrauded Barclays Bank of $700,000, using ill-gotten Apple gift cards.
Here’s how it happened.
Move over Xiaomi! While it’s easy to claim that China’s biggest smartphone upstart holds the crown for boldest Apple ripoff artist, Xiaomi has nothing on the Suwen University of Hong Kong.
If you haven’t heard of Suwen University, don’t worry: You’re not alone. It’s a fake, selling false diplomas and bachelor’s degrees online through China’s largest shopping website, the Alibaba-owned Taobao.
So what makes this a story about Apple? Well, take a look at the university’s impressive computer science lab, as it appeared in photos posted to the fictitious university’s Facebook page. For those unfamiliar with Hong Kong, it’s a photo of the city’s flagship Apple Store — albeit with a dodgy, Photoshopped logo to replace the instantly recognizable Apple one.
Apple still hasn’t opened an official store in the Middle East — and in Dubai that has allowed some otherwise past-it brands to not only eke out a modest existence but to thrive, complete with upmarket retail stores in shiny shopping malls.
Posted by Twitter user Mark McLaughlin during a sojourn in the UAE, the pictures portray a tranquil tech oasis as yet undisturbed by the disruptive forces of official Apple Stores. Like an island with no natural predators, that means that BlackBerry Stores, official Nokia outlets, and others can live together in non-threatened harmony.
But maybe not for much longer.
As China continues its march to become one of Apple’s most important markets, the country’s press have been given a special advance preview of the company’s forthcoming second Chongqing Apple Store, set to open at 10am local time this Saturday, January 31.
Not dissimilar to the concept behind Apple’s Fifth Avenue flagship store in New York, the new Chongqing Apple Store features a stunning glass structure emblazoned with the Apple logo, leading to an underground shopping area. In doing so, the store recycles the design Apple first created for its Pudong retail store in Shanghai.
Check out some some other beautiful inside images after the jump.
Given that Tim Cook thinks China will soon overtake the U.S. as Apple’s biggest market, it’s no surprise that Apple is taking its expansion into China seriously.
Amidst plans to open 25 new retail stores in the country by 2016, Apple has just released a new video showing a new mural outside its upcoming second Apple store in Chongqing, set to open at 10am local time on January 31.
The mural was created as a collaboration between international photographer and former engineer Navid Baraty (best known for these spectacular vertigo-inducing cityscapes) and artist Yangyang Pan.
Thermonuclear war may be over between Google and Apple, but that doesn’t mean that the two aren’t willing to score points against one another.
A few months after Tim Cook critiqued Google’s entire business model during his interview with Charlie Rose, and Google’s Eric Schmidt dismissed the bestselling iPhone 6 as a Samsung clone, Google has struck again with its latest act of aggression: a double billboard for Google Play positioned right next to a leading Apple Store.
Microsoft showed off a few neat concepts at yesterday’s Windows 10 conference. But while looking at the stage showed a company secure about its place in the tech world, turning around and facing the audience revealed a very different picture: a room full to bursting with MacBook-wielding journos.
Grasswire co-founder Austen Allred tweeted the above image taken at the event, adding the pithy understatement “A couple MacBooks at the Windows 10 Unveiling…”
If one were needed, it’s yet another reminder for longtime tech followers about just who won the PC war in the long run, despite Microsoft’s dominance during the 1990s. We can’t say we’re brokenhearted about it, either.
From gorgeous new architectural concepts, to its most ambitious retail store opening plan in years, Apple certainly isn’t slacking off when it comes to its continued expansion into China: a market that Tim Cook has said will one day be Apple’s largest of anywhere in the world, including the U.S.
Ahead of opening its latest brick-and-mortar retail store at West Lake in Hangzhou this Saturday, Apple has added a new video to its Chinese webpage — showing famous calligrapher Wang Dongling creating an astonishing mural for the store.
It’s a great nod to Chinese tradition, while also managing to be quintessentially Apple in spirit.
The Apple Store in downtown San Francisco got its own water fountain yesterday… sort of.
In the afternoon, a construction worker carrying out work on the the corner of Stockton and Ellis Streets, near to the Union Square brick-and-mortar store, accidentally burst a fire hydrant — resulting in a spectacular geyser of water erupting outside the Apple Store.
Although it didn’t last for long, the spectacle certainly made an impression on onlookers: one of whom filmed it using the slo-mo function on their iPhone.
When Apple comes up with an iconic design for an Apple Store, it often likes to replicate it elsewhere.
Just like the glass cube created for the company’s Fifth Avenue flagship store in New York has also popped up in other Apple Stores around the world, so too is the company reusing the glass cylinder entrance architecture design first created for its Pudong brick-and-mortar store in Shanghai.
The stunning 30-foot glass structure design will make a reappearance for Apple’s forthcoming Chongqing Apple Store, located in the city’s upmarket Guotai Plaza.
A new Apple online ad campaign called “Start Something New” has extended to Apple’s brick-and-mortar retail outlets — with the walls of Apple Stores being used to show off artwork created using Apple products.
Apple first launched the online campaign on its Japanese website, before extending it internationally. It shows off work in which “every brushstroke, every pixel, and every frame of film” was created by artistic Apple users, using software like the third-party photography and painting apps VSCO Cam and Waterlogue, along with better known tools such as iDraw and Final Cut Pro, and in-built features like the iPhone’s Panorama mode.
Real estate in New York? It just ain’t cheap. In fact, it’s so expensive that even if you have a successful business you might not be able to afford it.
Case in point? Look no further than Restoration Hardware. The American chain of home furnishings, hardware, and outdoor and garden products may be worth over a billion dollars in revenue as of 2012, but Steve Jobs once had to personally bail the company out.
Apple scooped up a couple architectural awards this week for the stunning engineering behind its magnificent Glass Lantern store at the Zorlu Center in Istanbul Turkey. The judges said it ‘takes structural glass technology to a new dimension’, and even though we’ve never been inside the Zorlu store it’s not hard to see why it’s getting showered with awards after looking at these pictures.
The Zorlu Store is the first Apple Store created by the same architectural firm behind the new spaceship campus in Cupertino, and it looks like the same amount of attention to detail and minimalist thought that goes into the creation of an iPhone was also poured into the new award-winning Apple temple.
Take a tour of the exquisite store below:
Apple has won another architectural award for the innovative glass engineering used to create its impossibly perfect glass lantern store in Istanbul, Turkey.
The Apple Store at the Zorlu Center in Turkey took home the Supreme award for structural engineering excellence from this year’s Structural Awards, and was also honored for its excellence in structural design for a retail building.
Apple is set to open its seventh New York Apple Store, with its long-awaited first brick-and-mortar retail premises in Brooklyn. The store will be located at 247 Bedford Avenue, on the corner of North 3rd Street, according to The New York Post.
The Brooklyn store boasts an impressive 20,000-square-feet of space over two floors. Prior to opening, the building will be refurbished, with the highlights being dramatic arching windows which will keep the space airy and light. Work is set to be completed in April 2015.
Apple announced today that in support of Computer Science Education Week, anyone can come to an Apple Store on December 11th for a free-introductory course on how to become the next great iOS developer.
The free coding workshops are part of Code.org’s Hour of Code initiative, that seeks to make coding a little less intimidating by educating people of all ages on the basics of computer programming, because like Steve Jobs once said, every American should learn how to code.
As part of its Apps for (RED) AIDS initiative, Fall Out Boy singer-songwriter Patrick Stump will make a special musical appearance at Apple’s SoHo brick-and-mortar retail store in New York City later today. Kicking off at 8pm Eastern, the December 4 performance is part of what Apple has called its “biggest fundraising push yet” to battle HIV.
Stump won’t just be playing, however. In addition, he’ll talk about Apple’s GarageBand app, and how he uses it as part of his creative process.
Apple Store logos around the world turn red today to mark Apple’s commitment to raising awareness of World AIDS Day. Red is a color synonymous with World AIDS Day, and the battling of HIV, thanks to the red ribbons first introduced back in 1991.
Apple has changed the color of its Apple Store logos since 2012. Apple has described December 1 as part of its “biggest fundraising push yet”. Any items bought through brick-and-mortar Apple Stores today will have a percentage of their sales donated to the charity.
The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus have been one of the hardest iPhones to date to pick up in store, and since launch, shipping times have stayed high. But as we approach the holidays, that seems like it’s finally starting to change.
A new Apple Store opening up is always something of an event. But over the weekend, a one-of-a-kind Apple Store opened in London, and I guarantee you’ve never been to one quite like it.
It looks like an Apple Store. It even sells various Apple products. But not the kind you’re thinking of: not Macs, but Macintosh apples.
Ever since Apple bought Beats for $3 billion back in May, Cupertino has slowly but surely been integrating the headphone maker’s products and services into the official Apple portfolio. It’s added Beats Music to the Apple TV, officially listed it as an Apple app on the App Store, and rolled out a Beats by Dre section at Apple Stores.
Now it looks like Beats by Dre headphones will officially be an Apple product in the biggest way that counts: You’ll soon be able to get them repaired or replaced at your local Genius Bar.
Although many — including Apple — would argue that Bendgate is overblown, and the iPhone 6 is no more prone to bending when treated right than any other smartphone, there’s a small but vocal minority that disagrees. If you’re one of them, there’s now a resource to track Apple Stores that will be sympathetic to your plight.