Shoppers seemed to be flocking to Apple’s retail stores on Black Friday, drawn specifically by discounts on laptops and iPods, and perhaps by price-matching. Visits to stores in the San Francisco area confirmed that all employees were on-deck to help provide service to the crowds of people, including about 20 who showed up at 3 a.m. (26 degrees!) to shop at the Jordan Creek (Iowa) store. The stores had a grab-and-go table of iPods, iPhones and laptops to speed purchases, a holiday gift brochure to hand out, and both an iPhone and One to One gift card. Since Apple doesn’t report monthly sales figures, the success of Black Friday will be rolled in to quarterly figures, which aren’t released until mid-January 2009.
The retail research firm ShopperTrak RCT Corp. reported that Black Friday sales were up three percent from the same day of 2007. Apple is a participant in the ShopperTrak system of computer-based visitor tracking, although it’s not clear if Apple also reports sales to the company.
Visitors to the stores confirmed they were able to trim up to $200 off the price of some products by verbally referring to the prices of other Apple authorized resellers under the stores’ price-matching policy. Even without printed documentation, employees referred to resellers’ Web sites to confirm the lower prices, and apparently had to obtain a manager’s approval. The Amazon.com Web site seemed to be popular among buyers as their price-matching partner.
Some shoppers also reported discounts on other major hardware, including 10 percent off hard drives.
Here is a selection of store collateral that was available to holiday shoppers on Black Friday.
Concierges handed out this 10-1/2" x 4" brochure to shoppers, and there were supplies on the display tables. The brochure gave prices as "$88 today only."
This 7" x 4" two-sided card provided "helpful" tips to shoppers, which repeat the tips that are routinely posted on the retail Web page.
A 4-1/2" x 5-1/2" cardboard sleeve (left) contained a three-fold cardboard presentation for a iPhone 3G gift card. The card amount is blank to allow the gift-giver to pay for the entire phone or only a portion. The sleeve says "Ring ring ring."
Apple is even selling its One to One personal training service as a holiday gift item. The 4-1/2" x 7" flip-open card reveals two-fold card, which contains the standard One to One information brochure, and a numbered membership card.
Heres the 3 a.m. crowd outside the Jordan Creek (Iowa) store on Black Friday. Not everyone in this crowd was there for the Apple store...of course.
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Nice that they price match OTHER stores. They had the Incase Power Slider on sale on the website. I went to Yorkdale in Toronto to buy it, and not only did the price not match the website, they refused to honour the website price. And this was the Canadian website.
Price matching?? Not at the Apple Store in the Grove at Los Angeles. I phoned before making the trek over there to see if they would price match other seller’s prices. Answer: NO.
So I ordered from an on-line retailer instead. Saved 10% on Apple’s retail price. almost the same again due to no sales tax and the merchant is paying for the shipping. No instant gratification, but what the heck …
They were NOT matching Amazon.com on MBPs at the Jordan Creek store.