“Dell Inc. has always prided itself on its online-only business model, the core component of a lean corporate structure that, for years, allowed the company to underprice and take sales away from its competitors,” Mike Musgrove reports for The Washington Post. “So it came as some surprise last week after the world’s largest computer maker, which has started to lose some ground in the marketplace, said it will open two stores, in shopping malls in Dallas and West Nyack, N.Y. These stores, however, aren’t typical cash-and-carry retail outlets. Visitors who decide they want Dell products will still have to go online and buy them through the company’s Web site.”
“It’s an approach to the retail market that has caused some chuckles among Silicon Valley types. Tech pundit Tim Bajarin said retail shoppers prefer the sort of instant gratification that comes from walking out of a store with a heavy shopping bag. ‘How would you feel if you went into a flower store to buy flowers and couldn’t walk out with them?’ Bajarin said,” Musgrove reports. “The move is an extension of the company’s 160 kiosks in malls and airports, which the company calls Dell Direct Stores. Dell hasn’t determined whether tech support will be available to customers through the two locations. IDC analyst Matt Eastwood called the stores ‘a classic Dell experiment. One area where Dell has been really struggling is in the consumer space, and this is definitely a response to that,” he said. “But I don’t know how you can run a retail store without carrying some inventory.'”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Tommy Boy” for the link.]
MacDailyNews Take: This classic Dell experiment has “failure” stamped all over it.
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Dell to open retail stores – May 22, 2006
The two things that really work for Apple retail are:
1. Customers can take home their purchases.
2. Customers can get repairs done and talk to geniuses on site..
Dell, has decided to forego both of those options.. They will fail.
Sounds more like cyber sex, than shopping.
Lets see how many people line up before those two train wrecks open.
Retail is hard, and why go out to buy something you cant take home.
Just buy your Dell’s online you know what it looks like, no need for a test drive on those boring boxes.
” I need a Dell honey lets pack up the SUV and kids find a mall parking space and go order one online at theDell store ! “
I honestly don’t get it. Didn’t Gateway prove that it does not work? Why go to a Dell Store and look at just Dell computers when you can go to a (insert big box store name here) and look at a whole variety of vendors.
Dell will not succeed because of their own doing. They made the computer a commodity item. What makes a boring beige or black Dell any different than an HP and why would I need to go look at one. They all do the same thing running the same software. What has Dell done to stand out?
Apple Stores work because people are interested in the unique features of the hardware and people want a hands on experience.
Who needs to goto a store to see a run-of-the-mill, commodity PC?
The lemmings will come don’t you worry.
Right. All I’ve read is the headline.
No. They won’t work.
It’s a stupid idea. Maybe, just maybe, if they can order one day and pick up a fully configured machine a couple of days later, then it could work.
Tesco in the UK is about to launch a section in its largerst supermarkets to sell ACER/HP PCs etc. Their buying power will rival Dell’s (£1 in every £8 spent in the UK goes to Tesco), so here certainly, it would be a case of picking one up with the bread and milk, or having order by phone, online or at an inconvenient store and then take a day off waiting for delivery.
There is one area in which Apple fails in its stores. That is to have a small display to sell alongside the mini. They should either make a 15″ and 17″ display or stock another quality brand at those sizes. Even sell them ONLY with a mini and make only a modest profit on them.
Most people go to the store so they can walk out with something in their hands. If a person is determined to purchase a PC they are not going to go to the mall so they can order one. Wouldn’t they just go to the Best Buy, Circuit City, or (insert other store here) and pick up a PC that they can take home with them today. Even Gateway learned this mistake the hard way and now you can walk out of best buy with one of their systems in hand.
Potential customers who go and see the real thing will discover how tatty the product is and will subsequently NEVER buy Dell.
For Apple it’s the reverse. People go into an Apple store, see how fantastic they are, and walk out with one even when they never intended to!
Not a clever move Dell.
um…. no.
Mmmm, sure miss those Gateway stores. I remember my pre-mac days. Tooling around a Gateway store, shopping for a few PC’s for work. I go to order them at the desk and ask where should I pull my truck up to load them. That’s when I learn that they’ll be delivered in 2 weeks.
So I left.
I think events like this will be happening by the thousands in the Dell stores.
…now relax everyone of course if anyone knows me they know that i will copy Apple’s retail store strategy & even its look, but i have to kind of use decoy to save some face for now you know… I’m burnin bad sitting here & watch Steve’s stores growing fast…
The logic is not to get someone to drive to the mall to order online but to attempt to capture some of the people that are already at the mall. That part is reasonably sound. It is the lack of merchandise that will doom the stores to failure — let’s hope they open many.
Here is what I think Dell Store will look like:
Very dark. A bunch of black boxes. Very dark. Cool neon blue lights popping out of everywhere. Blacklights? Still, very dark.
Either way, It’s going to be hard to find a salesperson to help you. The “help” will usually be busy “helping” other customers navigate the dell.com site: figuring out which options they need (3yr Onsite? or 4yr Next-day? warranty), where to find the special deals/coupons, Excuse me sir, why is my order not showing up in “my cart”?, Huh? The site lost my “e-quote”? I have to do this over the phone?, etc.
Anyone think these “retail stores” will go beyond the first 2 stores?
I liked the idiotic suggestion that Dell might be buying Apple!
That would be like Microsoft employing Van Gogh (rip) to do their clipart.
They better not have Genius bars. There will be lines around the block with people hauling in their POS equipment.
On second thought, lets encourage them TO open a Genius bar!
MW: trade. “I’d like to trade this in for an iMac, please”
Inventory?
I’d say will they work without anything interesting to talk about….
“Over here we have another Windows-infested featureless Dell in another ugly case…”
Wasn’t that the Gateway model for their company stores?
these stores will end up being nothing but Windows Genius bars.
They will not get any other business than that.
People will FINALLY have someone here, rather than in India, to grab and hold on to while trying to explain their windows problems to.
They will even bring in their huge machines – probably with the monitors and mice and stuff too.
These stores are the beginning of the death spiral for Dell.
It would be interesting to see what the costs are for the small storefront. It may compare with TV advertising and be written off as such.
MW: Why is Apple’s “STOCK” still going down?
I don’t think people are moving away from Dell because you can’t buy them in malls. Forgetting OS X, even if you look solely at the Windows market and ignore the fact that people are getting tired of Windows, their ultimate problem is that their machines aren’t very good.
I want them to open one here in the St. Louis area — preferably in one of our two malls that have Apple stores. It would be so much fun to walk into a Dell store and start asking questions about importing photos, creating a show with music and then burning to DVD to send to my parents. Or on creating a podcast. The entertainment value would be priceless.
Hey iSteve, why would you harass someone who works in a store? Retail employees are high school / college kids there to do a job wether they are Apple, Dell, Compusa, whatever. Buy what you want but don’t treat this like a religion where you need to mock and destroy people who don’t follow your beliefs.
Get real.
The Dell ship is sinking. This is EXACTLY what the Gateway stores were like.
Dell: “Come in and see our PCs, design exactly what you want (so long as it fits in our options list)!”
Buyer: “Umm, when do I get my new PC?”
Dell: “We’ll mail it to you in a couple of weeks.”
Buyer: “I can do that in my PJs.”
Dell: “But you won’t have been able to see our cool store from home!”
Buyer’s friend: “Dude, you’re getting a Mac. It runs OS X and Windows, and you can take it home today. We’re outta here.”
Agreed. Not carrying inventory is silly. Even Gateway Stores, towards the end, carried some inventory for just that reason.
people like you should go to iraq
Dell intends to build stores in malls where Apple retail stores already exist. How many people will wait in line over night for Dell to open its doors? Does http://www.ifodellstore.com exist?