Apple has missed a great opportunity to market their products in the face of Windows Vista’s poor acceptance, partly because the company hasn’t extended its retailing reach beyond its own stores and a limited number of resellers. San Jose State University business professor Randall Stross writes in a New York Times opinion piece that in the face of Vista’s introduction, “Mr. Jobs and his managers did not enlist resellers for the Mac with the same enthusiasm that they showed in building Apple’s own network of retail stores.” He concludes that Mac sales have limited room to expand, in part because the company has withdrawn from marketing to corporations.
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Tim
September 16, 2007 at 8:04 pm
dan
September 18, 2007 at 11:40 am
pat
September 23, 2007 at 9:10 am
John C. Randolph
September 24, 2007 at 12:57 am
Thom
October 4, 2007 at 5:33 pm
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The linked article had earlier highlighted some of these same points in regard to the eleven European Apple Stores and for all of Apple’s products, not just Macs, as Apple had not even set up many of their own stores. In the upcoming launch of the iPhone in Europe, the lack of retail presence in Europe might finally be noticed by someone in Apple Cupertino as “there is no there, there” that they control and are able to mandate shelf space, ad space, sales efforts within. Ditto here in Australian with no Apple Store. http://www.macsimumnews.com/index.php/archive/opinion_european_iphone_launch_concerns
Apple wants to be perceived as a premium brand. No sense in flooding the market like Microsoft, in fact, the Apple stores and the limited accessibility actually lead to an increased desire. (i’m sure the statistics exist somewhere.) Besides, Apple’s marketing strategy is as infamously mysterious as its PR record.
I think Apple just wants to control the message and not allow resellers to set up bad looking displays. I think Jobs may regard resellers as leaches, unfortunately. That’s what he called the cloners.
Same reason Apple doesn’t want to clone, anymore. They could very likely have a really huge increase in marketshare.
The question is, does marketshare really matter? I don’t think it does.
Stross is the author of the book “Steve Jobs and the NeXT Big Thing”, which was a half-assed hatchet job. SJ didn’t give him an interview, and neither did anyone working for NeXT. Stross has been in a snit about that ever since, and nobody in silicon valley takes him seriously.
The real story here is how the Times was so slipshod as to let this clown write for their editorial page. They have reporters like Pogue and Lewis who actually do have a clue about this industry.
Let me also add that Stross’ being hired as a “professor” by SJ state lowers my opinion of that school considerably. I guess they don’t have the budget to hire competent instructors.
-jcr
I grew up in a university town, and a favorite saying of my dad’s was “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach”. Dad’s been retired for over 25 years. He was an administrator at the Student Union and has had a lot of exposure to educated idiots. Steve Jobs has and continues to do, Stross on the other hand teaches and writes drivel, with his lame ideas it’s about all he can do How much have you done for the humane race Stross? Jobs record speaks for its self, like him or not he’s been on a roll for 3 decades. Stross on the other hand appears to have had his crank stomped on to many times, not enough as far as I’m concerned. People like Jobs and Bill Gates happen not that often, pin heads like Stross happen all the time.