The very first sighting of a impressive new Apple store-within-a-store concept has appeared at a Walmart store in Arkansas, just 20 minutes from the mass merchandiser’s home office. The new displays could be the prototype for a rumored expansion of in-store Apple displays to Sam’s Club, the warehouse retailing division of Walmart. The displays feature tall, double-sided, back-lit graphics, a clean-looking wood table, live display products and under-table accessory storage with security glass. The new look updates previous Apple product displays within Walmart stores that have been notoriously small, invisible and poorly maintained. The store is located in Rogers, a town of 56,000 residents located along I-540 in the northeastern part of the state. Apple pioneered the store-within-a-store concept at CompUSA stores in 1997, but Apple’s graphic design was always better than CompUSA’s maintenance and staffing of the product area. The concept lives on at Best Buy and Target stores, where products are usually spread over several display areas. Update: Commenters report both that the design is already in use in other countries, and that an employee of the store said it was the “first” in the United States.
Thanks to Jeff for these photos at the Walmart in Lowell (Ark.), adjacent to the Pleasant Grove Shopping Center.
The tall, back-lit displays can be seen from a distance within the store, and from both sides.
The display table has a very clean and simple appearance.
The products are live and displayed attractively.
Under-table storage provides visibility and a nice visual design. The security glass is inconspicuous.
Apple's traditional acrylics are part of the design. Product security is more strict than in an Apple store.
E-mail this story
{ 31 comments… read them below or add one }
Next Comments →
Wait, I don’t get it. What’s do special about this? We’ve had these very “store within a store” things in Australia for nearly a year! BIG W and JB HiFi both have them in many stores, with BIG W only offering iPads and JB offering the full range, which looks exactly like what is pictured here.
I can get some photos when I’m there next if you like?
Yeah some of the Dick Smith stores are doing it too. The better performing apple stores first and then it will roll out at all apple locations.
Theres something about australia and not being important on the world scale.
because there is a whole world outside australia…
Its funny you say that. In America, they don’t know that. Amd as it stands, people are mearly discussing this type of setup has already been around for quite sometime.
We’ve also had these Apple Store-within-a-store in PC World, and I think Tesco, in the UK for years.
“Saturn” (huge tech shop) in Frankfurt, Germany, exactly the same furniture (shape, color, size, etc) since 2 years. They offer all Apple products, even the 27″ iMacs.
Clearly the post talks about Walmart specifically, so this is news. You’re referring to a different retailer.
And the USA has had these for years inside Best Buy stores…
I hate that Apple merchandise is displayed at all in a Walmart. I don’t care how nice the display. Walmarts are trashy and will always be that way. It cheapens the Apple brand.
That sounds pretty pretentious. Don’t think of it as the apple brand being tainted, think of it as apple bringing some peace to an otherwise chaotic environment. Steve always said the best way for him to positively influence the world was through apple’s products; having apple producs in Walmart certainly fits with that goal.
Walmarts are not trashy out here in the west. Apple is displayed although not as splashy as the picture shows. We also have the nook and Kindle fire in Walmarts also. There are a lot more companies than Apple out there that are just as good as apple and can do what apple does. So If they need to advertise they need to advertise in the largest Company in the world. If a little clutter brings the customers in then I am all for it. Ben Franklin 5and dime was even more cluttered when I was a kid and we loved to roam the isles. Woolworths also was very cluttered. They had all sorts of inexpensive items that the big stores didn’t carry.
“There are a lot more companies than Apple out there that are just as good as apple and can do what apple does”.
Who?
I read one comment where the guy said only white trash shopped there. Wonder what kind of trash he is, –red, green, blue, black, brown? I always think people who comment like that won’t like hell either. sad–
Walmart has been selling Apple, and very successfully, for years. Walmart is the #1 retailer in the US and the world. Most Walmarts, at least the new format stores as this one is, are really nice, and for those of us that need to save money an equally nice alternative. Given their success it seems enough people, and Apple, feel the same way.
For Apple, 80 percent of America lives within 30 min of a Walmart, many open 24 hours, with Apple slowing US expansion this is a fast and low cost way to reach more more customers where they are. With close to $450 Billion in sales I think they’ll find quite a few!
I beg to differ about one thing and that’s the product security. The display models are no more secured than what’s in the stores and those cabinets can be broken into. Compared to Apple stores where you have least two employee only doors, one if not both are secured with a limited access passcode.
Apple believes user experience should trump product security as far as product display goes.
If somebody wants to take something, they’ll find a way to do it. There’s no reason to punish the 99.99% that want to experience the product, by binding it up or, worse, making it unusable.
Looks like a variation of this display has already appeared in Italy, and perhaps other locations.
http://bit.ly/HNb0eo
From another Web site: An employee of this store told a visitor that this display is a prototype, and is the first in the country.
It is one of 30 pilot stores.
What’s so mind-blowing about this? Most large tech stores in Asia and Australia already have their Apple sections which of course are differentiated by their higher quality wooden tables. I’ve never been to America before, don’t tech stores in America have their Apple sections too?
we had em in the uk for ages.
Dont get it. I’ve seen this display arrangement already at a Best Buy for several months. Ironically, it’s one of the stores that’s closing.
Apparently, I’m behind the curve…
Wow! From the number of comments this generated I think this is going to do just fine for both Apple and Walmart!
This store is actually located in Rogers, AR, about 5 minutes from my house.
Pleasant Grove is in Lowell NOT Rogers.
Thanks for the correction to the city in which the store is located. The store is about 2,000 feet from the Rogers-Lowell city boundary, leading to my confusion.
Putting Apple in Walmart is a terrible thing to do to the ” APPLE ” Name. Why would they want to lower there standards ???
Walmart is know for being Union Hater’s, and they treat there employes like SH” ”.
You’re an idiot elitist snob!
Walmart has been selling all of these devices for years! More than any other retailer other than Apple.
Grow up!
amen
Is there one in Nogales Arizona Walmart? the 1st and 3rd pic looks like from Arizona’s Walmart.
We already have lots of theese for more than one year ago in Portuguesel MediaMarkts and Wortens they are still there being mantained weekly by Apple staffs. In that apple places everything is carefully organized.
{ 58 trackbacks }