“The popularity of iPhones, iPods and iMac computers are making the flagship Apple store in Regent Street the most profitable per square foot in London, analysts said today,” Lucy Tobin reports for The Evening Standard.
“Takings have soared to £60million a year, or £2,000 per square foot – more than double the estimated sum made by Harrods,” Tobin reports. “Neil Saunders, a spokesman for retail analysis agency Verdict, which estimated the figure, said: ‘To make £60million a year from a shop of Apple’s size is absolutely phenomenal.. Apple’s Regent Street store has extremely strong footfall, since it has become a tourist attraction in its own right, and as it stocks its own products, it controls the price, helping it to boost profit. Shoppers pay a premium for the Apple brand, and there is never discounting, so customers don’t waver over buying elsewhere.'”
“Analysts estimate that Harrods is making £751 per square foot, while Topshop in Oxford Circus takes about £1,000 per square foot. Rival electrical retailers average about £722 per square foot,” Tobin reports. “When the Apple store opened in 2004 it was the firm’s first European branch. But the business has expanded to 21 in Britain, including branches in Brent Cross, Westfield and Bluewater.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Note: From our iCal’s “They’ll Never Live It Down” calendar: “I give them two years before they’re turning out the lights on a very painful and expensive mistake.” – David Goldstein, Channel Marketing Corp. President, remarking on Apple’s launch of retail stores, May 21, 2001
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dominic” for the heads up.]
