“Best Buy Co. Inc. is taking a little nibble of Apple computers,” The Associated Press reports.
“The nation’s largest consumer electronics retailer is testing the possibility of selling Apple Computer Inc.’s full line of computers in its stores,” AP reports.
“Best Buy has added Apple computers in seven stores and it’s considering expanding Mac sales across the chain, Best Buy Senior Vice President for Merchandising David Morrish said at the company’s annual meeting on Wednesday,” AP reports. “Morrish said the test began four weeks ago.”
AP reports, “Morrish said the computers are being sold by Best Buy employees who have been trained by Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple. He said Best Buy is watching to see whether the computers can be sold profitably, and whether Best Buy employees can provide the level of customer service that Apple customers are used to getting in an Apple store.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: It’s good to hear that Best Buy employees charged with selling Macs have been trained by Apple. Maybe this thing has an outside chance of working after all?
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Related MacDailyNews articles:
Analyst: Best Buy may ‘rapidly’ expand Mac pilot program – June 05, 2006
Best Buy mucks up MacBook photo on website; shows MacBook Pro instead – June 01, 2006
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It’s official: Apple acknowledges Best Buy to carry Mac mini models – April 05, 2005
Oh, yeah!
the key of course is consistency. were i a bettin man, not sure i would put money on this one…
They are actually Apple employees in the L.A. pilot stores. Think of the CompUSA Apple guys in a Best Buy.
This is great. I know many who hate going to the Apple stores because they feel threatened by the elite attitudes of the employees there. Some people just want a pimple faced dork to go get the right box for them- not help them integrate their digital lifestyle. What’s different here is that the employees are actually going to get the box instead of steering them into a junkbox from hell.
MDN say’s, “Maybe this thing has an outside chance of working after all?”
Have you ever purchased something at Best Buy. I would sooner have a root canal. If it boosts Apple’s market share, good for them. Me, I’ll stay at the Apple Store on-line or travel to a brick and mortar. Best Buy does not equal “best” service.
I doubt it’s going to work, Apple is a religion and requires to create a “church like” atmosphere where their products are sold.
Best Buy employees are there to make a paycheck, not to become evangelists.
It takes a incredible amount of dedication and thoroughness with Mac’s to be able to solve people’s problems when they come in the store.
I’ve only seen a handful of Apple Store employees who really knew their stuff and I don’t think the Best buy environment will nurture any sort of dedication to Apple’s products.
They will still be Best Buy employee’s first because that’s where their paycheck comes from.
Apple’s products will be something Best Buy sells, like Nokia phones, or HP printers or Cannon scanners. There is only so much room in their tiny heads and can’t possibly know everything about a Mac.
However I do wish them the best of luck, perhaps if the commission was good?
gotta be better than the staff in pc world in uk, intel imacs with g5 tags on, in a mess in the corner lol people using photobooth and moving along to a flimsy plastic emachine for £300
Hope the training helps cause I can’t see them giving a S@$% after a while. Can’t beat the feeling you get at an Apple Store, from the look of the store to the knowledgable sales people(they’ve been great at every store I’ve been to) But what the hell I guess it’s worth a shot.
This is the best way to handle sales of Macs at Best Buy. You want the product to be properly represented but you also don’t want to give the appearance that Macs can only be operated by a few outside specialists.
I am a Mac elitist and I don’t even speak to the employees at an Apple store. I have run into more than one snotty putz during my visits.
Apple better tone down the pretentiousness. Go back to SHOWING friendly computing not just talking about it. Because if the OS is as friendly as the salespeople at an Apple store I wouldn’t buy a Mac either.
I used to love Apple Stores. I guess I still do, but last time I was at one (the michigan ave store in Chicago), I had a terrible experience. I was buying a macbook. I know all one could ever need to know about Macs, so I went straight to the register and asked for the computer. The lady would not sell it to me until I talked to a “Mac Specialist”. Frankly, this pissed me off. I am more of a mac specialist than most of the people in that store, including the “geniuses”, and they only have that policy so that they can try to sell me bullshit that I don’t want. I had to go through the fact that I didn’t want a printer, or .Mac, or AppleCare, etc. I knew what I wanted and I didn’t want to spend an hour talking to the PC-using punks who work in those stores.
I had a friend get told from an Apple “Genius” once that using limewire would give his MAC all sorts of spyware. We all know that macs don’t have issues like that. This guy was obviously generalizing his PC knowledge onto all computers, but why oh why was he doing this from behind the genius bar? Apple needs stricter hiring standards and better selling policies.
and they suck at it…. I have to 3 different Besbuys and they have no idea how to sell Macs. The only good thing is that Mac sell itself and having it in Bestbuy will give Macusers a chance to do a one-stop-shop if they evey need to go to Bestbuy for other purchases.
From what I’ve seen of Best Buy, I don’t envy the Apple trainers, especially on the first day:
“All right, men. Anyone here who has ever used a Mac, raise your right hand.”
“NO, NO! YOUR RIGHT HAND! YOU IDIOTS! MORONS! THAT’S IT! HOW DID YOU EVER GET HERE IN THE FIRST PLACE?!? YOU’RE FIRED! GO! NOW! YOU’LL NEVER WORK IN THE TECH SECTOR AGAIN!!!”
<angrily leaves, slamming the door>
<second person hesitantly walks in front of the blue shirted group>
“Ummm….if anyone has a question for Steve, please hold it until the end of training. Thank you.”
“Best Buy test-selling Macs using Apple-trained Best Buy employees”
Good start. Let’s hope all the other pieces are in place, i.e. proper stock levels, proper sales incentives, etc.
Does anyone know which Best Buy stores will be testing Mac sales? I would be fun to test the sales person. I hope Apple employees test them. I was at Best Buy the last time they tried this; the horror!
I think that the best you can hope for is ambivalence from Best Buy staff. Which is an improvement over antipathy!
Look them big words up!
bestbuysux.org
’nuff said!
One day of training by Apple Computer will do nothing for these guys’ knowledge of the products. This is a doomed failure.
Only those who can follow zee orders vill be allowed to train. Heil, Jobs!
Ten bucks says this fails. Again.
BB Canada has been ‘selling’ Macs for better than a year. I’ve talked from Associates to Managers trying to convince them to carry atleast the top 20 games and top 20 app software — somewhere near the ‘Mac section’.
They politely listen. And a year later, they’re still selling version 1 of iWork. No Photoshop, No Office, no games — as limited as this is, no OS9 software in a fscking tumble bin, nothing.
On second thought, I’ll raise my bet to $2000.
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Best Buy hires people who claim they know pc’s, not Macs. Over the course of 3 years, while working on the road, I visited Best Buys all over the country. The people working on the floor of every BB I walked into (and there were many) have a clear attitude of Windows first and last. No discussion of Apple hardware, software, or compatibility with 3rd party peripherals is taken seriously – ever, period.
That’s reality, like it or not. I don’t believe, nor do I waste time hoping, that BB will ever be able to sell anything but cheap crap in the realm of personal computers.
CompUSA, (yes I also did my own personal pole for Apple there too), is slightly better. No. 1, they actually carry Apple products, and some stores actually carry the whole computer. The anti-Apple attitude is toned down a bit, and generally, sales people are willing to try and answer questions about whether or not RAM, or hard drives, and other peripherals/internals will work with a given piece of Mac hardware. Countrywide, I’d say CompUSA has a far better chance of becoming a legit. Apple rep. Best Buy? Really, don’t waste your time.
I think the main thing here is the employees are trained by Apple. Now if Best Buy would just start selling Mac software again.
FTA: [Macs] are being sold by Best Buy employees who have been trained by Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple.
Just as I suggested on MDN when the Best Buy pilot program broke — not that Apple was waiting on such advice. But it is good to see that Apple “gets it.” The coverage that BB can add to Apple Marketing is huge. Apple does not want to cheapen its brand by setting up in strip malls. Let others, such as BB, invest their money in those locations and it helps boost Mac (and iPod) sales. BB should about cover all those potential Apple customers who are too far away from an Apple store.
Cross your fingers that the pilot program is successful. And Apple needs to treat its retail partners well and not utterly screw them when product is short.
” The lady would not sell it to me until I talked to a “Mac Specialist”.
Probably because a lot of stores now have dedicated cash register people and she wasn’t knowledgable about the MacBook.
“Frankly, this pissed me off. I am more of a mac specialist than most of the people in that store, including the “geniuses””
Then why don’t you saddle up and work there on weekends, and then you’ll see what a really difficult job it is dealing with hotheads like you.
“and they only have that policy so that they can try to sell me bullshit that I don’t want.”
It’s not a “policy” that they want to have the right people talk to you about your purchase, and they do not force people to buy stuff they don’t need, but want to make sure you have everything you do need. Offering options and services to people is a good way of providing a complete solution, and it is in everyone’s best interest to offer complete solutions.
Apple trainer to Best Buy trainees:
“First lesson – Repeat after me: Steve Jobs is God”.