Twenty -four years ago, Apple noted that many industry experts considered a risky enterprise, which would eventually change the fate of the company, but retail. On May 19, 2001, Apple opened its first retail store at the Tyson Corner Center in Virginia, in which Steve Jobs personally showed presses around the revolutionary place.
Tyson corner apple store
Some 500 curious visitor stores were lines before the morning to experience the stores of hard wood floors, bright light and clean lines. Aesthetics compared the retailer gap of trendy clothing. Not surprisingly, Given that the Gap CEO Mickey Draxler was on Apple’s board for two years at that time.
The decision to enter the brick-and-mortar retail came at an indefinite time for Apple. With around 2.8%of the market share, the company was struggling to effectively show its products through third-party retailers, where MAC was often re-accused to corners and employees by clerks with minimal product knowledge.
Jobs believed that Apple would never shed his “creed” image until he can control the entire customer experience, just below the moment of purchase. In the nominated biography of Walter Isaqson of former CEO of former Apple, Jobs said: “We were spoiled until we could find the ways to receive our message to customers at the store.”
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To lead this vision, Jobs recruited Ron Johnson, who changed the image of the target with his designer merchandise line. Together, they formulated the concept of the store in a secret warehouse prototype, which refines every detail from single-edge layout to revolutionary genius bar, inspired by Johnson’s experiences in Ritz-Carlton Hotels.
Apple’s board initially turned his hand over the idea, especially after its only 40 stores of the gateway were closed and Apple’s sales fell 29% last year. Industry analysts had even more doubts: channel marketing analysts David Goldstein famous that Apple is “drawing light out at a very painful and expensive mistake” within two years.
Instead, until 2003, Apple recorded a $ 3 million profit per quarter per quarter with around 60,000 visitors at each location. In 2004, Apple Retail hit $ 1.2 billion, which broke the fastest Arab-dollar record in retail history.
Tyson Corner’s personal tour with Steve Jobs
Today, Apple operates 534 stores in 27 countries, with each location about $ 5,500 per sq ft – the highest in the retail industry. What started as a controversial gambling has become the cornerstone of Apple’s success and is a blueprint for experienced retail that continues to follow the contestants.
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