It was 2 o’clock in the morning but in the subterranean retailing mecca in Midtown Manhattan, otherwise known as the Apple store, it might as well have been midafternoon.
Even late at night, there are customers on the floor of the Apple store in Midtown Manhattan. Apple now makes about 20 percent of its revenue from its brick-and-mortar stores.
And through the night, cheerful sales staff stayed busy, ringing up customers at the main checkout counter and on hand-held devices in an uninterrupted stream of brick-and-mortar commerce.
The party inside that store and in 203 other Apple stores around the world is one reason the company’s stock is up nearly 135 percent for the year. By contrast, high-flying Google is up about 52 percent, while the tech-dominated Nasdaq index is up 12 percent.
The article moves beyond the catchphrase designed to suck in both fanboyz and Apple haters – “aura enchants the faithful”. That’s worth a small snicker. The important bit is that Apple derives 20% of their income from their retail stores.
Read the article. I think you’ll appreciate that they’ve not only contributed to technology design in an industry overwhelmed with outdated concepts – Apple has added to the body of contemporary retail merchandising.
Apple stores generate sales at the rate of about $4,000 per square foot a year…
As other electronics makers like Dell, Nokia and Sony still struggle to find the right retail formula, Apple seems to have perfected it.
A measurable portion of retail success is founded on recreational shopping. Getting non-geeks into their stores is as important as anything else. The result of that process is Apple leading more consumers into appreciation of what computing technology now offers in access to information and entertainment.
#33 Steve invented DOS? Wow. Didn’t know that. Wait..maybe you are thinking of some other idea of Steve’s that Bill got rich off of. None come to me offhand though..maybe he invented the word processor? spreadsheet? Sorry, these just aren’t sounding right. Any idea what you’re talking about here? I’m pretty sure that unless you are talking about putting already existing tech into prettier packages and advertising that owes more to Absolut and BMW than IBM and GE, I am not aware of any ideas that anyone would want to steal. You certainly aren’t talking about a windowed GUI are you? If so..maybe you’d better go back and read some histories of the times. I’ll admit no more on that than first to the general market with it, and even then not enough confidence to compete head to head with anyone, deciding the only way to make it work was to keep it in a controlled environment, assuming it would fail if let loose to compete with the others.
He does have the guts to push through his ideas of what people want, and the corporate money to make it happen, and good on him for it! He has in innumerable ways pushed his competitors kicking and screaming into the 20th century, but many others had those same ideas at the same time or earlier, but without their own multi million dollar multi national to make them work. Not his fault, but not a stroke of genius either. In fact, much like the guy you hate so much works.
I also don’t find the ability to glad hand people and be liked to be the great social traits you seem to think. To me they are the signs of the con/sales man. I know I’m cynical about the entire field of sales, but I must admit I’ve never seen anyone in the field disabuse me of my experiences. At best, a necessary evil, but usually just lying weasels.
Nice try, but…BZZZT!
No one said anything about DOS. And yes, BG did not invent it, thank you. He bought it from SCP and licensed it. He created not Jack Shit.
Steve, with the help of Steve, actually invented the PC as we know it today. BG was nowhere around.
And Billygoat Billyboy didn’t REALLY start raking in the money until he ripped off the Mac’s windowed-GUI-with-mouse. Xerox doesn’t enter into it, unless you actually believe they were trying to sell $50,000 Star systems for people to use at home, writing their own apps in Smalltalk. So leave Xerox out of it. They dropped the ball.
First PC. First GUI. First laser printer. That’s more than enough innovation for anybody.
For your convenience, I am providing you with a blank space which you may print out and write in the names of all the things BG has created in his life.
Here it is: ______ …and at that, I don’t think you’ll run out of room.
So, who’s really the salesman – y’know, the one created nothing but model for how to profit handsomely off of someone else’s work? 😛
Tasty Kool-Aid, ain’t it, Shin, that M$ flavor?
BZZT right back. You said..BG got rich of off Steve’s ideas. Just silly. I did not say BG invented DOS, I know the story as well as you do at least..and however he acquired the base code..it was not from Steve. Even if Steve did invent the pc as we know it today (and I had 2 of them), it wasn’t the Steve we are discussing here. This one found the financing and sold it…and maybe did parts runs and some soldering..^_^.
Xerox did drop the ball. And both your god and BG saw it bouncing about. S just figured out he could appropriate the Xerox work and not get sued. BG was more cautious. S put it in a machine that was useless, drove me and many others right away from apple, lost the business market almost totally…and his whole business might have gone down the tube if the devil hadn’t decided to bail him out and have his staff write versions of the business programs for the Mac. Nothing you have called innovation came from Steve..(curiously, the same amount that came from that other businessman).
And with that..businessman is the right term, for both. I don’t know how this turned into trying to make me an MS fan. The only reason that I recall I mentioned them was to point out the “peas in a pod” factor. Never said anything nice about BG…outside of maybe suggesting he’s not the devil. I suggest looking the the heads of other major corporations..(you can start with the few who’s deeds we know a bit about..maybe check your local federal prison). The PARC people made a reasoned and socially responsible decision not to claim prior art and sue apple back to the stone age. True innovators and the real men of the people, not the guy who decided to steal their work and make millions on it. Or..if you prefer..neither of them.