“Apple has unveiled new concepts for its flagship retail stores in a transformation led by Angela Ahrendts, the former Burberry chief executive hired by the technology company two years ago,” Hannah Kuchler reports for The Financial Times. “Speaking at a preview of the first new store in San Francisco, Ms Ahrendts said the retail properties were Apple’s ‘largest product,’ which she had been charged with reimagining. Like the iPhones and the Macbooks, she wants the stores to be ‘considered and beautiful.'”
“The unveiling was the first big announcement from Ms Ahrendts since she joined Apple in May 2014,” Kuchler reports. ” Ms Ahrendts made her name bringing a digital angle to the luxury goods brand Burberry before joining Apple, where she was given a stock grant worth up to $68m.”
15 years ago today, we opened our first 2 Apple stores. Now we have 478 stores worldwide and over 60k employees that make it all so magical.
— Angela Ahrendts (@AngelaAhrendts) May 19, 2016
“The stores would retain Apple’s ‘iconic’ glass walls and the wooden tables which Sir Jony Ive, the chief design officer, uses when creating the devices, she said,” Kuchler reports. “The new store, on San Francisco’s central Union Square, has floor to ceiling glass doors that open on each side of the building, allowing light and air to flow through. But Ms Ahrendts’ team, working with London-based architects Foster & Partners, have developed five new features that will be rolled out to global flagship stores.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Note: Features debuting in the new Apple Store, Union Square include:
• “The Avenue,” inspired by the window displays along a boulevard that dynamically change with the season. Avenue walls are interactive themed “windows” where Apple’s products and services come to life, from music, to creativity, apps, photography and more. New “Creative Pros,” Apple experts in creative arts, offer advice and expertise at each of the displays. Customers will also find “Only at Apple” products on the Avenue, a curated collection of third-party accessories.
• “Genius Grove” invites customers to get support working side-by-side with Geniuses under the comfortable canopy of local trees in the heart of the store.
• “The Forum” is a gathering place centered around a 6K Video Wall. It is home to “Today at Apple,” which brings to the community the world’s most talented artists, photographers, musicians, gamers, developers and entrepreneurs to inspire and educate Apple’s customers to go further with the things they are passionate about. “Today at Apple” includes year-round programs for kids, new monthly events for teachers, sessions for current and aspiring developers, Creative Sessions in partnership with local experts in creative arts, Game Night with editors from Apple’s App Store and more. The Forum and Video Wall are a place of discovery, including events about the making of movies from iTunes, or exclusive premieres of new music and music videos from Apple Music.
• “The Plaza” will be found only at Apple’s most significant stores, including Apple Union Square. It’s open to the public 24 hours a day, features public Wi-Fi and seating, and takes “Today at Apple” outside, with a regular weekend series of well known local acoustic performances such as Travis Hayes and global talents like Escondido, who will then give exclusive interviews about their craft in the Forum. The Plaza at Apple Union Square features a fountain by well-known San Francisco sculptor Ruth Asawa, originally commissioned in 1969, and a new work, “Love” by local artist Laura Kimpton, commissioned by Hyatt Hotels.
• “The Boardroom” is an intimate space where the store’s Business Team offers hands-on advice and training to entrepreneurs, developers and other small and medium business customers.
SEE ALSO:
Apple’s new Union Square store highlights new retail elements, including ‘Genius Grove,’ ‘The Forum,’ and more – May 19, 2016
I must say, if you’re gonna fail, do so spectacularly.
Ahrendts has an entire design/ architectural team at her disposal and the best they can come up with this?
How long is Apple gonna keep propping her up?
Please share with us your EXTENSIVE business and design background that allows you to be so utterly dismissive of these ideas.
Also, if you want to portray yourself as knowing better than such a successful businessperson, at least be impeccable in your spelling and grammar.
the entire C-suite is out of touch and cook does not have the fortitude nor leadership qualities to turn the bloated ship around
How far Apple has fallen. Ahrendts is the poster child of Apple’s slide into pretension and elitism. Used to be Apple was at the forefront of empowering people through digital technology now Apple is more concerned with fashion and pomposity. Apple for the people is now Apple for “The People”. I am dismayed, disgusted, and angry.
I don’t think any human being living today has sunk or fallen to your depths of depravity, doofusity and scurrilous unfounded opinions made like a troll running for Troll King office. I shall coin your posts essentially “LoserSpeak.”
We are all equally dismayed, disgusted, and angry of your unfortunate pusillanimous existence. Kindly drop dead, get lost or take a long walk off a short plank. Your choice.
“How far Apple has fallen.”
Oh yeh — from the most successful company on the planet all the way to…… the most successful company on the planet.
“I am dismayed, disgusted, and angry.”
So kindly fuck off.
Taking out a few preposition, articles, etc. — here’s the deep wisdom of One Note Joe…
fallen, pretension, elitism, fashion, pomposity, dismayed, disgusted, angry
Yehhhh. Fabulous contribution to the discussion, One Note.
Couldn’t agree more. The solid gold watches a perfect example.
Now if there were some decent products to buy in these stores I wouldn’t mind. But Apple are too busy chasing rainbows, apparently, to be bothered with their Mac users.
And “luxury” stores aren’t going to make any difference if there are no products worth buying in them.
Your too busy being One Note Doofus Joe. Or his brother.
Sure, peterblood71, on a planet of 7 billion people, you decide that two people who disagree with your incessant Apple apologism must be related….
That tells a lot about you disassociation with reality. The world has become disenchanted with Apple because Apple has changed. Apple is not the scrappy underdog doing everything possible to please the user. Apple is a dominant player and is no longer delivering the experience to the user that it formerly did. All your online incivility towards others won’t change their less-than-acceptable experiences with Apple products.
As for myself, I have no respect for the practice of making computers expensive by adding superficial luxury to it. Ahrends was obviously hired at ridiculous expense to turn Apple stores into a luxury house, and so far, it doesn’t seem to be impressing anyone except Apple executives and archiecture magazine reviewers. User experience in Apple stores is not improving, and retail employee morale is actually rather low. Apple needs to do better.
Also, ditch the ugly blue T-shirts. Maybe Ahrends can take some of her $75 million first year compensation to buy decent employee uniforms.
Obviously you’re the one with a tenuous grasp of reality. Those “two people” are simply “one person” using different names. Simply using pejoratives & slander without any real points, real talking points, data or intelligent discourse = juvenile Troll Moron. The fact that’s okay with you speaks volumes about your own culpable cluelessness. i don’t give a flying fig about hate talk born of a miscreant’s miserable life that offers nothing to this discussion. Joe here and his many pseudonyms I would wager has never seen the inside of a debate class, who would make mincemeat out of him (and you defending his trash talk). Opinions are also not facts. And when that same opinion is nauseatingly voiced over and over in the most hateful way possible it gets a little old. Don’t bother posting here if that’s your only mission. But that’s what lonesome trolls do.
Like I said you agree or defend these idiots then you are also one of them and a big problem. It has nothing to with Apple fanboyism either. I agree with many reasoned intelligent complaints here about Apple and I have some too. But it doesn’t excuse cretins like Joe with their childish chaotic ramblings and spittle spew that offer up nothing. When you go over a certain reasonable line then you can except a harsh rebuke. The Internet has allowed bad boys to speak their vomit views but I like to think the majority of the MDN crowd here are intelligent adults and not sociopaths like Joe aka whatever.
The last half of your post was a reasonable post but the problem are those neanderthals are incapable of voicing similar more thoughtful prose that contributes, not merely inflames and leaves. Whatever you do, please don’t feed or support them!! You just make it worse.
You sewed up the market on those two items exclusively already as a major doofus and you fool no one troll. Go away, you seem to have no ability to make cogent and coherent arguments that aren’t laced with denigration and hate as their main virtue or written above third grade level. I’d say go fuck yourself but you no doubt do that already to turn-on images of Eric Schmidt. Your work here is done Samsung lackey.
Seems like some pretty innovative ideas to me…I’d like to visit such an Apple Store. The 6K video wall, the creative pro demonstrations, the stuff for kids and teachers…all seem pretty great for a retail store.
This is just an extension of the way Steve Jobs envisioned the Apple store where people could come in and see and try out just what the products could really do. It was meant as a community space as much as a store. This takes it to a whole other level.
With most of the critics here, they would complain no matter what Apple did.
Especially that raving loon One Note Doofus Joe.
Maybe Joe is correct. The $95 share price suggests he might be.
Uhhhhhh, no. If you don’t understand how the market works in regards to Apple by now then you’re as equally stupid and part of the ignorant problem. Figure it out genius.
Sunbeam Rapier = the not very clever & hiding One Note Doofus Joe
Compared to every single other POS (piece of shit, for those who really need the clarification) brand out there Apple is head and shoulders above them all in quailty of product and services. In fact the word luxury or quality dosen’t even enter anyone else’s vocabulary…
Maybe it is indeed time to make the distinction glaringly obvious by marketing and promoting Apple’s affordable and unrivaled luxury and touting it to higlight the distinction between Apple and the shit herd of Androids &Co.
You/we are on a dark road when your justification is “compared to every other….”
Apple’s standard isn’t based on every other POS out there.
Your comprehension is astounding, he didn’t ” justify ” or say anything about Apple’s standard.
I was OK with Apple hiring Ahrendts , even paying her all the money for the Burberry stock she lost, as she had increased Burberry stock by 300% (or something) and was obviously a cut better than the previous guy.
I’m OK with her revamping stores for more luxury…
BUT maybe she should deal with stuff like this first? :
an Apple users experience of “Four Hours of Apple Store Hell”
http://www.zdnet.com/article/four-hours-in-apple-store-hell-what-iphone-upgrade-customers-need-to-know/
—-
I agree with the article that the SOME Apple stores I’ve visited have become hot, overcrowded , difficult to enjoy places.
also Last christmas Ahrendts kept talking to the press about stuff like ultra expensive THIRD PARTY speakers etc and NOT ONE WORD about things like MAC. (she’s also in charge of the Apple retail website , in the main Apple Christmas promotional photo there was just a FRAGMENT of a Macbook edge in one photo– I was looking for it — ! ). Stores have become accessory boutiques (like a high end Best Buy) rather than the place to showcase ALL of Apple. Others have said you can find drones but not thunderbolt docks.
My last experience at the Apple Store was awesome…yes it’s crowded and noisy, but that’s because it’s a good place to be…it’s like Disney World, etc. They had plenty of employees, who were all uniformly very nice.
As to Ahrendts…she is head of retail…she is not the one to speak about the main product lines like Mac…that is covered by plenty of other people at Apple. But anyone who works in retail knows that accessory sales are an important source of revenue to any store, and with Apple, the accessories help justify the main product. For instance, with drones you use an iPhone or iPad, and of course may also use a Mac to work with the video footage.
“As to Ahrendts…she is head of retail…she is not the one to speak about the main product lines like Mac…”
eh?
that is NOT part of job of head of RETAIL ? I was in advertising, marketing and it is bizarre to me that a MARKETING exec like Ahrends (who reports directly to Cook) does not have as part of her responsibility to push a core product of their OWN company. Like the HEAD OF FORD RETAIL who coordinates all the Ford dealers does NOT need to talk about Ford TRUCKs but just third party speakers? that’s your argument????
when reporters ask her about Christmas, she talks tells them the Apple stores are stocked with wonderful third party speakers but never mentions Mac, that is OK for HEAD OF RETAIL? during the main Apple photo for Christmas in the online store a FRAGMENT of Mac is shown and the device is not showcased, that’s smart?
“the accessories help justify the main product. ”
NOT when accessories overshadow major products like Macs or products like docks which make Apple products work. Very few other retailers carry stuff like Thunderbolt connectors as many PCs don’t use them. My local Walmart which sells Macs doesnt’ carry any Thunderbolt products. one person said when he went to an Apple he couldn’t find them there either, so all those Thunderbolt equipped Mac apple sold, they are basically screwed? while shelf space is given to accessories you can find anywhere? So who is going to support the specialized Apple eco system or push it?
Christmas Dec NYT article:
“SAN FRANCISCO — Angela Ahrendts, Apple’s senior vice president for retail, got a private demonstration of the fancy wireless speaker, the Phantom, and its sound quality seven weeks ago. On the spot, she said she wanted the space-pod-like device, which starts at $1,990, to be sold in Apple’s retail stores.”
nothing wrong with that EXCEPT show me the articles she’s pushing iMacs, or Mac Minis or Mac Pros. Some people stupidly tell me Macs are NICHE, they are more niche than $1,900 speakers?
so if head of Apple retail doesn’t push Macs etc, parts of Apples OWN product line, who is going to do that? Amazon?
“it’s like Disney World, etc. ”
did you actually READ the Zdnet article I linked to about Apple Store Hell?
The stores in Vancouver and San Francisco were really overcrowded went I went there, couldn’t even touch the iPads etc on display, too many people.
Like I said REVAMPING stores for luxury is good but deal with the mechanics of overcrowding, streamlining of purchases (again read the link article) etc first. In SOME locations if enlarging the store is too hard, they have to rent other stores elsewhere in the mall etc and put the servicing etc parts of the store there . (I don’t know if they have implemented any of this already as I obviously can’t visit every store).
look people, to be clear I’m not trying to beat up on every aspect of Apple Stores or Ahrendts (go look at my first post where I say things like “I’m OK with her revamping stores for more luxury” ) and I’ve emphasized that problems don’t go to every place by even capping “SOME”.
But we have to admit as from the link article I posted that there ARE problems, and while selling as much accessories as possible is good ($$$), there is in my estimation some confusion nowadays about Apple Marketing.
Macs made more money than iPads last quarter yet it practically no marketing attention (where the ads for example? ) and Apple pushes out stuff like Thunderbolt saying it’s a better connector yet it’s left to wither . Remember the widespread complaints about the Mac App store? were the complaints from people like me invalid? Why did Cook apologize later and then shift Schiller to deal with it then? (so some complaints against apple are valid)
There seems to be neglect and confusion of Mac’s role in the eco system (note also product confusion : the macbook AIR which is supposed to be lighter has MORE ports than a Macbook. This confuses the heck out of customers). and some Apple stores gradual pushing Macs to the back while showcasing third party accessories more isn’t helping.
Not all the above are under Ahrendts preview of course, but as second most important marketing person at Apple after Schiller (she’s SVP rank just like Schiller) she has a big part in inputing marketing ideas. Note the Jobs had marketing teams work in tandem with product people as they were conceptualized and designed.
Jobs created Apple Stores to showcase and expound on APPLE products (as third party retail stores were failing in it. ). If Apple stores today slowly get out of doing this are the outside retailers Jobs was unhappy with supposed to do it now?
Ahrendts seems not to fully follow Jobs philosophy, she actually questioned why there were so few third party products in the stores (which Jobs kept to a small select minimum as not to overshadow Apple products) and T.C said to her go ahead and change. and she went gangbusters. Perhaps this is a right move (?) long term but I question it. It’s an Apple Store concept i don’t fully get, I think more like Jobs: Apple Stores, places to experience and buy iOS devices, Macs and Apple made gear, places to showcase how Apple products work and are tied to together . to expound on the superiority of Apples software like OSX, not places really to put $1900 third party speakers on a bigger pedestal than Macs. (People note Apple also makes more money, profit selling their own than other manufacturer’s products as they keep all the profit).
Looking from the outside I think that Ahrendts doesn’t seem to have been properly ‘discipled’ into Apple or perhaps Apple has changed so much that even I a long time Apple user and aapl investor is losing comprehension of it.
The past two years have not been a good time to advertise Macs, because models with the latest Intel processors haven’t been available.
Well, you’d think Apple would be advertising old inventory blowouts. Instead, it seems Apple’s plan is to take obsolete hardware and sell them at inflated prices in BRIC countries that have no significant Apple product distribution, and therefore have no prior price points for Apple products to compare to. This is Apple’s way of establishing itself as the Bang & Olufsen of the computer world. All style, no substance.
If Ahrends thinks Hermes watch bands are going to bring in more foot traffic to Apple stores full of antiquated Macs running crappy consumer-grade software, she’s clearly not the person for the job. She’s not going to be successful in getting computer users to go to Apple stores to get overpriced 3rd party accessories that Amazon sells for significantly less.
There was a time when Apple stores were full of people buying new products and taking classes. Now most people I meet in Apple stores are there to try to figure out what they used to be able to do on a prior Apple device, or trying in vain to find a model that replaces their legacy device. Now they can’t figure it out for themselves — or it simply doesn’t work, thanks to increasingly buggy Apple software. Fashion will not improve the situation.
“The past two years have not been a good time to advertise Macs”
two years?
show me the great Mac Ad campaign equal to Mac/PC Guy (get a mac) where Jobs had ONE NEW Ad a month ( 66 different ads in 4 years) in the LAST SIX YEARS then.
note: macs make more money than iPads last quarter yet over the last few years iPads had plenty of ads. So Macs are not money losers so why no ads?
There are a whole bunch of new Apple Watch ads to yet Macs make more money and are probably more important to the eco system.
Macs also have a SMALLER market share than iPads or iPhones, i.e PLENTY of room to grow.
also why didn’t Apple advertise during the Windows fiasco years, don’t you think that was a great opportunity? Instead now Win 10 shipped 300+ million copies.
“because models with the latest Intel processors haven’t been available.”
eh.. why then are HP workstations in tests SIX times faster than current cylinder Mac Pros? (an HP renders a video in 2 hrs vs 12 hrs for the Mac)
Why do Windows PCs can have 512 MB of Ram while Mac Pros are sold by Apple to have max 64 (128 from unauthorized third parties)? Macs Pros costing thousands of $$$ with 3 GB Video cards vs PCs with 8 or even 12 GB cards?
Barefeats shows a SIX YEAR old previous generation Mac Pro with UPGRADED card beating a CURRENT cylinder Mac Pro 2-3 TIMES in GPU tasks and beating a CURRENT Macbook Pro 5 TIMES (this is absurd)
http://barefeats.com/imac5k20.html
(NONE of the current macs can have upgraded video which is crazy as video cards are different for different uses. Ever see a high end pro- gamer at Blizzcon etc use a Mac? Why is that? )
BAREFEATS ALSO (like many home hobbyists ) MADE A HACKINTOSH WHICH IS SEVERAL TIMES FASTER THAN ANY CURRENT MAC.
SO HOBBYISTS IN THEIR BASEMENTS CAN BUILD FASTER MACS BUT APPARENTLY YOU SAY APPLE CAN’T?
also what is the excuse for having the Macbook Air having MORE PORTS than the Macbook? the Air is supposed to be lighter , doesn’t that CONFUSE shoppers? (i read even read PRESS reporters who are confused, they say apple doesn’t have a cheaper Macbook than the Pro with more than one port… )
DOES all the above show what you’re saying that Apple is constrained by Intel only or does that show what I am implying that Apple execs including Ahrendts have NOT REALLY KEPT THEIR EYE ON THE MAC BALL ?
Hmmm… you need a subscription to view the full article on ft.com. Can MacDailyNews or anyone else provide a link to a site that doesn’t require a subscription? Thanks.
Personally I like the look. But lets be honest here Angela Ahrendts had nothing to do with any of this. She’s neither a designer or architect . Just like when she was a only a merchant at Burberry . She had nothing to do with concepts . She was just a merchant . Here she’s just a spokeswoman being paid way too much
Trump has “luxury”.
How about better computers?
Nothing ‘Magical’ about the Apple stores. Just overcrowded, loud, and trying to get help is like pulling teeth.