Opening the Apple Store in Bristol

Excited Bristol Apple Store staff, preparing to let in the first customers

It’s hard to get the British excited about something, especially a new shop. But that does’t stop the staff at the shiny new Bristol Apple Store doing their level best to get the queue outside cheering and waving. A bit.

It has to be said: this store opening is unlike most others. Central Bristol ground to a halt this morning because an entire shopping mall, encompassing several surrounding streets, was opening for the first time.

The Apple Store was just one among 150 or so shops welcoming new customers. The opening ceremony for the mall included a MC on a cherry picker, shouting bad poetry and exhorting the crowd to spend and spend. And four drummers sat at four drum kits. The sound echoed around the streets and made the echos made the drummers sound out of time with each other. But nobody minded. Dancers and free runners danced and ran freely. And eventually, Mr MC man declared the Cabot Circus (warning: eye-wateringly awful web site) mall open. The masses flooded in to spend their money.

But that was only half the queuing for the Apple fans. The mall opening is over, and now they have to rush down a newly-opened street and start a fresh queue inside steel crowd barriers. And there they wait, for another 30 minutes, while Store staff do the usual whooping and cheering and getting people excited.

The queue, queuing

Like I said, though: the British tend not to get excited that easily. Witness this Mexican wave; at best, you could call it half-hearted:

Bad Mexican wave from Giles Turnbull on Vimeo.

Who comes to a thing like this then? Who was queuing up, and why?

Christie’s here. She looks about nineteen. Why are you here Christie?

“Because my dad’s at work, and he sent me specially.”

But why?

“To get the T-shirt.”

So you’re not going to be shopping for anything? A new iPod, perhaps?

“I have an iPod. My dad has four. He’s a bit obsessive.”

Clearly.

The front of the queue

Here’s Matt. How about you, Matt?

“I’m here to open the Bristol Apple Store.” I don’t think he means he’s actually doing the opening.

It turns out that Matt is in charge of British Mac and is very pleased that he won’t have to trek down to the Southampton store any more.

“I’ve been going down there every other month or so, for the workshops. They’re so useful.”

Will you be buying anything?

“A dock and a case for my iPhone.” He shows me his iPhone. It’s in a Nintendo DS case. Point taken.

And James. Tell me James, are you going to buy anything?

“Probably not, because I haven’t got much money.”

James’ friend confesses: “I’m just here for the free stuff.”

Onlookers are bemused. “What’s going on here?” asks a chap in his 50s. A policeman says, in a sarcastic tone: “They’re queuing up for free T-shirts.” The 50s guy snorts. “That’s silly.”

The Store staff don’t think it’s silly. They are shouting and screaming their heads off, literally making themselves hoarse with the excitement.

The queue gets shorter, and less willing to play along. The staff try nonetheless, their whoops and their yells and their wild cheering echoing off the buildings around.

The Apple fans queue up in an obliging, polite, hard-to-excite, terribly British fashion. And the rest of the world squeezes past, completely absorbed in all the other new shops, and probably not all that bothered about computers and iPods and stuff like that.

Giles Turnbull

Giles Turnbull is a freelance writer in England. He also writes for the Press Association and The Morning News. You can find out more at his website, and follow him on Twitter @gilest.