January 31st, 2005

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There’s lots of buzz about which other retailers will be selling the new Mac mini and iPod shuffle–Best Buy has added products to its Web store, and an official said they’d have the products in all Best Buy stores by the end of February. The AppleInsider Web site claims Wal-Mart has ordered 250,000 iPod shuffles, [...]

January 31st, 2005

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Ouch! I won’t embarass the specific store, but when demonstration iPod shuffles arrived at one store, the staff quickly sold them to customers–leaving nothing to display in the ‘music’ section of the store. That’s right–no replacements from Cupertino! The only evidence of the new mp3 player is a large, green-colored poster with a photo of [...]

Fresno Possible Future Store Site

January 31st, 2005

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The gang at mall developer Madison Marquette Realty Services is feeling pretty confident: they manage Bay Street in Emeryville, site of a current Apple retail store, and they’re close to signing Apple for a lease at Manhattan Village in Manhattan Beach (S. Calif.). Now I’ve learned they’ve proposed The Shops at River Park in Fresno [...]

January 31st, 2005

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Attention Third Street Promenade store staff in Santa Monica! On your lunch hour this Thursday and Friday, walk a half-block down the street, where Microsoft will park a trailer to let passersby go hands-on with its "digital home on wheels." It’s all part of the company’s "Windows on Wheels" tour that has dates all across [...]

January 31st, 2005

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The Christian Science Monitor newspaper profiled Steve Jobs, and included an anecdote that describes his attention to detail. It perhaps explains the attention to detail that Apple’s products and retail stores receive from the Top Guy.
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January 31st, 2005

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Like many retailers, Apple tracks returned merchandise, not only to keep track of inventory, but to determine why it happened–which feeds back to the sales process, Genius Bar operation, etc. If you return a product, a store staffer will eventually fill out a form that includes several fields of information that include the yes/no questions, [...]

January 31st, 2005

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Apple’s Retail Web page now shows "workshops" instead of "presentations," although it’s not obvious how the one-hour, sign-up sessions are different from one another.
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Reseller MACadam Closing

January 31st, 2005

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Here’s the short end to a long story– Apple reseller MACadam is closing after 16 years. The San Francisco-based reseller has a long history with Apple, including a recent lawsuit that owner Tom Santos has filed against the company alleging unfair business practices. Download (pdf) his “goodbye” letter, in which Santos recalls his very first [...]

January 27th, 2005

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I’ve added several links to blogs, photo albums and news stories for the Nagoya Sakae (Japan) store grand opening.
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January 27th, 2005

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An article in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune includes quotes by Sr. V-P Retail Ron Johnson, who said he wants to use the so-called "iPod halo effect" to "persuade consumers to try out Macintosh computers when they browse in Apple’s stores for iPods." Read the entire story on-line.
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January 27th, 2005

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Johnson also talked to The New York Times about the Genius Bar concept, saying the Bars are the "soul" of the stores, and, "It’s the part of the store that people connect to emotionally more than any other." The story says the Genius Bar came to Johnson, "one night when he was thinking about the [...]

January 27th, 2005

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The AppleInsider Web site says work will begin shortly on the previously-identified mid-town New York City store location, on Fifth Ave. at 58th Street, next to the CBS "Early Show" studios, The Plaza hotel and toy retailer FAO Schwarz.
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January 27th, 2005

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More feedback on the Nagoya Sakae (Japan) store grand opening last weekend: One attendee said the T-shirts were all distributed by noon, and that store staffers came down the line to announce that fact to those still in line, and that iPod shuffles were sold out. One man was so upset that he used "very [...]

January 24th, 2005

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On this day in 1984 Steve Jobs pulled the very first Macintosh out of a black cloth bag at the Flint Center in Cupertino (Calif.) and introduced it to the world. Now a video of that event has been posted on the Web, including the standing ovation that Steve received from the crowd. If you [...]

January 24th, 2005

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Apple has posted small photos of 49 of their retail stores on individual pages, and I’ve collected them into album format so you can compare the various storefront designs side-by-side.
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