I really wish Apple would send secret shoppers from Mac user groups into Best Buys across the country and see just how fucking clueless those Best Buy people, especially the "Apple ones" really are. Then take them to task!
With all the mishaps during launch, oddly the hype on iPhone is still going strong. Am I the only person to think Apple and their phone carriers are charging wayyyyy to much for service?
If you think this agreement means that you will be able to buy a iPhone at Best Buy without an AT&T contract, or on another provider, then you are mistaken. If you already have an iPhone, this news means nothing to you. If you want to get an iPhone, this news still means basically nothing to you. In fact, other than Best Buy shareholders, this news means nothing to almost everyone.
Of course. This has nothing to do with the arrangement between Apple and AT&T. As long as the account is going to AT&T, which it will, AT&T is only too happy to have more retailers sell the phones. The more places it's sold, the more accounts AT&T gets from it.
How will they activate the phones in-store? In a Bestbuy store?
A couple things come to mind.
For one, It's not actually required to activate the store that I can tell. What is required is that you sign a contract and associate the phone with the account, which is retrieved by scanning the bar code on the box. When I bought mine, they couldn't get the activation working right then, the guy said to just take it home and hook it up to iTunes. iTunes will take care of the rest.
Another, all that's needed is a cut-down version of iTunes to activate it, a version was made just for retail activation. I don't know if the Best Buy point of sale system can run iTunes, all it takes is a small notebook computer.
So the long lines are because there just arn't that many places to buy the iPhone?
I thought it was short supply.
It's a little of both. The bigger stores seem to have the phones, or so I've been told, but it's the time it takes to process each order that's holding sales back as well. If a sale takes a half hour to complete with the work on the account (having to explain service options to people etc.), activating the phone (or phones), then 95 sales equals 47.5 hours of sales time for the phones per store on average, per day. Thats a lot of time, and there are only so many people in each store who can do that at once.
It's a little of both. The bigger stores seem to have the phones, or so I've been told, but it's the time it takes to process each order that's holding sales back as well. If a sale takes a half hour to complete with the work on the account (having to explain service options to people etc.), activating the phone (or phones), then 95 sales equals 47.5 hours of sales time for the phones per store on average, per day. Thats a lot of time, and there are only so many people in each store who can do that at once.
Good points.
I see one other thing happening with this.
I've been in a lot of AT-T stores, and it's almost like they don't want to sell the iPhone.
Either it isn't even in the big white display case, or the rep doesn't really want to talk about it.
Apple is going to fix it so there are a lot of local stores to go visit if the Apple store is too far away or too busy for you. And these are not AT-T stores so if the AT-T people don't want to push it...... Best Buy will be happy to do it. A little competition.
Apple services their products no matter where they were bought.
UpDate: The part is now locked in Buy Buys' Geek Squad van as the technician went on vacation. But Best Buy already had a back-up plan. About 10 days ago they "over-nighted" a duplicate part that hasn't arrived yet. I am in a major U.S. city. They promise to "overnight" another one. That should leave 19 in inventory. Best buy?
A lot of guys seem to love knocking BB, but it's not that simple.
If Apple is happy with the results of their new relationship with BB, because they are selling a lot of Macs there, as by accounts they are doing, and if BB is happy with Apple to the point of expanding the number of Apple stores within the premises at a faster rate than was expected, then it means that things are working out well.
I've been to a number of BB's, and have looked at the Apple stores. They are anywhere from not too busy, to very busy. I see sales people helping people, showing them the machines and software, answering questions. I haven't seen any problems.
The few salespeople working in the Apple stores there that I have spoken to have told me that the stores are doing well, and that they were trained, and that some actually work for Apple itself.
As BB likely makes more money from selling Apple products, because of the average selling price at least, there is no way that they will push PC's instead. This store within a store concept that Apple first did with CompUsa costs a lot of money to both Apple and BB. There's no way they will allow that money to be thrown away.
The world has changed. People who used to ride me hard for having Macs are now interested, or have already switched themselves. Because of that, when walking into a BB, you no longer get that "Apple what?" look.
Even when I'm in a PC only computer store buying something, and I'm asked which computer I have, I now get an interested look, or an "ah!", rather than the disdainful look, or disparaging remark that was common until a couple of years ago. I find the same thing to be true at BB.
I'm not him, but fuck you. It is too much by any sensible measure. 3G or some form of cellular data should be in everything that moves, and the only reason it isn't is because of artificial constraints by monopolies, nothing natural.
That said, it wouldn't be so bad if... THE DATA WERE ACTUALLY UNLIMITED.
I'm not sure what merited the harsh language. But yes that is a lot to ask for because the telecommunications companies have to pay multiple-billions in spectrum fees, towers set up, and software maintenance to spread a 3G signal. So yes they are going to charge a premium for its use.
Anyone is free to set up their own 3G service and charge less for it, if they are so inclined.
UpDate: The part is now locked in Buy Buys' Geek Squad van as the technician went on vacation. But Best Buy already had a back-up plan. About 10 days ago they "over-nighted" a duplicate part that hasn't arrived yet. I am in a major U.S. city. They promise to "overnight" another one. That should leave 19 in inventory. Best buy?
That's why, after you buy your phone, if you have a problem, you bring it to an Apple store, assuming you can get to one of course.
I bought a DCS range about 6 years ago. Apparently, from shipping this (it weighs 650 pounds) one of the silicon carbide gas starters broke. I didn't even bother with the place where I bought it. I called DCS up directly. They sent me the part, I removed the front panel, and replaced it myself.
Not everyone can do that, but if it's a choice, I always choose it first.
A lot of guys seem to love knocking BB, but it's not that simple.
If Apple is happy with the results of their new relationship with BB, because they are selling a lot of Macs there, as by accounts they are doing, and if BB is happy with Apple to the point of expanding the number of Apple stores within the premises at a faster rate than was expected, then it means that things are working out well.
I've been to a number of BB's, and have looked at the Apple stores. They are anywhere from not too busy, to very busy. I see sales people helping people, showing them the machines and software, answering questions. I haven't seen any problems.
The few salespeople working in the Apple stores there that I have spoken to have told me that the stores are doing well, and that they were trained, and that some actually work for Apple itself.
As BB likely makes more money from selling Apple products, because of the average selling price at least, there is no way that they will push PC's instead. This store within a store concept that Apple first did with CompUsa costs a lot of money to both Apple and BB. There's no way they will allow that money to be thrown away.
The world has changed. People who used to ride me hard for having Macs are now interested, or have already switched themselves. Because of that, when walking into a BB, you no longer get that "Apple what?" look.
Even when I'm in a PC only computer store buying something, and I'm asked which computer I have, I now get an interested look, or an "ah!", rather than the disdainful look, or disparaging remark that was common until a couple of years ago. I find the same thing to be true at BB.
I don't usually quote an entire long post to reference, but every word of this is golden. I could have written it myself.
I have helped a couple times recently at the Apple Table in our local Best Buy, and the response was fine. More like "Oh really? It can do that? Cool." They weren't particularly knowledgeable about Macs, but not disdainful either, which was often the case in big box stores just a few years back.
And these days, so many self-proclaimed 'techie' folks (knowledgeable or not ;-) ) think the iPhone is golden that I think there's a good shot the sales people may actually encourage people to buy it. At a store that carries many brands and services, this could be a very good thing. We'll see.
It's a little of both. The bigger stores seem to have the phones, or so I've been told, but it's the time it takes to process each order that's holding sales back as well. If a sale takes a half hour to complete with the work on the account (having to explain service options to people etc.), activating the phone (or phones), then 95 sales equals 47.5 hours of sales time for the phones per store on average, per day. Thats a lot of time, and there are only so many people in each store who can do that at once.
Thanks, Mel. I did not realize that the bottleneck was in the setting up of the account.
I wonder if these problems are there with the at&t stores too? Or if they have full availability. I suspect that I would rather buy from an Apple Store all things being considered--but not if there was a 2 hour wait!
Quote:
Originally Posted by wbrasington
I think you can assume where there are long lines...... there is not short supply.
Well, that is far from the only possibility. People could line up in the morning to be sure to get one before the day's allotment is sold out or something like that.
Quote:
In other words, the stores that are out of them have either really short lines or long lines of really stupid people.
The one thing learned from The Soviet System, the longer the line the better the item you get when you get to the front of the line. So if you walk by an Apple store and see a long line out in front and the AT&T store has no line, then OBVIOUSLY the iPhone you get at the Apple store must be better!
Reminds me, when Mcdonalds opened their first store in Moscow, they had to keep an employee out in front at the end of the lines for the cash registers. If they had 5 registers open and each had 5 people in line, and by general movement if you ever ended up with 7 or 8 in one of the lines, people would start going to THAT line thinking somehow that it must have something better at the counter because it was a longer line. So they needed to dedicate an employee at lunch time to explain... "No, really! Every line has the same stuff. You can get anything you want at any of the lines! Really!"
So if you see a long line at the Apple store, the store probably has iPhones.
(unless you hear a lot of Russian being spoken by the people in line and maybe they're waiting for toilet paper......)
I think you can assume where there are long lines...... there is not short supply.
I'm sorry. I just read this line in isolation quoted in my previous post and it just seemed so much more absurd. One of the surest ways to generate long lines is constrain supply.
Go back to some of the most enduring images of the end of the Soviet Union and that was all you would see--long lines at stores with bare shelves.
I'm sorry. I just read this line in isolation quoted in my previous post and it just seemed so much more absurd. One of the surest ways to generate long lines is constrain supply.
Go back to some of the most enduring images of the end of the Soviet Union and that was all you would see--long lines at stores with bare shelves.
Yes, but at the Apple store it's simple.
When the iPhone is gone..... so is the line.
The line is caused less by low supply as it is by slow activations and high demand.
There are stores that have had a line from the minute they open in the morning until the minute they close, without running out of product. The supply is contrained mostly by the activation times in that case. If Apple really could have 25 people in the store dedicated to signing up iPhone customers they could probably eliminate the lines. But I think the bottleneck is caused by the time it takes to activate and not by the lack of supply.
There are contrained by supply, I know and agree.
But if they plunked down another 5 million phones this weekend, the lines would keep plugging away slowly even though they had the product.
Does show just how good last years approach worked compared to the AT&T approach.
Reminds me, when Mcdonalds opened their first store in Moscow, they had to keep an employee out in front at the end of the lines for the cash registers. If they had 5 registers open and each had 5 people in line, and by general movement if you ever ended up with 7 or 8 in one of the lines, people would start going to THAT line thinking somehow that it must have something better at the counter because it was a longer line. So they needed to dedicate an employee at lunch time to explain... "No, really! Every line has the same stuff. You can get anything you want at any of the lines! Really!"
This is a great image as well. To someone whose culture has always shown them stores will ample supply, their actions seem ridiculous. But they were simply following the logic of a different system--not being stupid.
I fail to believe that there are many people in the US these days who would make the same mistake...
[edit]
Sorry trying to type with a fussy baby--killing my typing and my thinking.
Rest assured, I get that the iPhone's lines at Apple stores are due to the activation process. You and Mel have cleared it up for me. I was getting sidetracked by ancillary issues...
Comments
With all the mishaps during launch, oddly the hype on iPhone is still going strong. Am I the only person to think Apple and their phone carriers are charging wayyyyy to much for service?
Yes....
If you think this agreement means that you will be able to buy a iPhone at Best Buy without an AT&T contract, or on another provider, then you are mistaken. If you already have an iPhone, this news means nothing to you. If you want to get an iPhone, this news still means basically nothing to you. In fact, other than Best Buy shareholders, this news means nothing to almost everyone.
Of course. This has nothing to do with the arrangement between Apple and AT&T. As long as the account is going to AT&T, which it will, AT&T is only too happy to have more retailers sell the phones. The more places it's sold, the more accounts AT&T gets from it.
It also explains the stock climb the last couple days. I wish I was an insider trader, obviously there are plenty of them out there.
No. Not at all. The markets have been going up because the price of oil has kept falling. Apple's price is just following that trend.
How will they activate the phones in-store? In a Bestbuy store?
A couple things come to mind.
For one, It's not actually required to activate the store that I can tell. What is required is that you sign a contract and associate the phone with the account, which is retrieved by scanning the bar code on the box. When I bought mine, they couldn't get the activation working right then, the guy said to just take it home and hook it up to iTunes. iTunes will take care of the rest.
Another, all that's needed is a cut-down version of iTunes to activate it, a version was made just for retail activation. I don't know if the Best Buy point of sale system can run iTunes, all it takes is a small notebook computer.
So the long lines are because there just arn't that many places to buy the iPhone?
I thought it was short supply.
It's a little of both. The bigger stores seem to have the phones, or so I've been told, but it's the time it takes to process each order that's holding sales back as well. If a sale takes a half hour to complete with the work on the account (having to explain service options to people etc.), activating the phone (or phones), then 95 sales equals 47.5 hours of sales time for the phones per store on average, per day. Thats a lot of time, and there are only so many people in each store who can do that at once.
So the long lines are because there just arn't that many places to buy the iPhone?
I thought it was short supply.
I think you can assume where there are long lines...... there is not short supply.
In other words, the stores that are out of them have either really short lines or long lines of really stupid people.
It's a little of both. The bigger stores seem to have the phones, or so I've been told, but it's the time it takes to process each order that's holding sales back as well. If a sale takes a half hour to complete with the work on the account (having to explain service options to people etc.), activating the phone (or phones), then 95 sales equals 47.5 hours of sales time for the phones per store on average, per day. Thats a lot of time, and there are only so many people in each store who can do that at once.
Good points.
I see one other thing happening with this.
I've been in a lot of AT-T stores, and it's almost like they don't want to sell the iPhone.
Either it isn't even in the big white display case, or the rep doesn't really want to talk about it.
Apple is going to fix it so there are a lot of local stores to go visit if the Apple store is too far away or too busy for you. And these are not AT-T stores so if the AT-T people don't want to push it...... Best Buy will be happy to do it. A little competition.
Apple services their products no matter where they were bought.
UpDate: The part is now locked in Buy Buys' Geek Squad van as the technician went on vacation. But Best Buy already had a back-up plan. About 10 days ago they "over-nighted" a duplicate part that hasn't arrived yet. I am in a major U.S. city. They promise to "overnight" another one. That should leave 19 in inventory. Best buy?
If Apple is happy with the results of their new relationship with BB, because they are selling a lot of Macs there, as by accounts they are doing, and if BB is happy with Apple to the point of expanding the number of Apple stores within the premises at a faster rate than was expected, then it means that things are working out well.
I've been to a number of BB's, and have looked at the Apple stores. They are anywhere from not too busy, to very busy. I see sales people helping people, showing them the machines and software, answering questions. I haven't seen any problems.
The few salespeople working in the Apple stores there that I have spoken to have told me that the stores are doing well, and that they were trained, and that some actually work for Apple itself.
As BB likely makes more money from selling Apple products, because of the average selling price at least, there is no way that they will push PC's instead. This store within a store concept that Apple first did with CompUsa costs a lot of money to both Apple and BB. There's no way they will allow that money to be thrown away.
The world has changed. People who used to ride me hard for having Macs are now interested, or have already switched themselves. Because of that, when walking into a BB, you no longer get that "Apple what?" look.
Even when I'm in a PC only computer store buying something, and I'm asked which computer I have, I now get an interested look, or an "ah!", rather than the disdainful look, or disparaging remark that was common until a couple of years ago. I find the same thing to be true at BB.
I'm not him, but fuck you. It is too much by any sensible measure. 3G or some form of cellular data should be in everything that moves, and the only reason it isn't is because of artificial constraints by monopolies, nothing natural.
That said, it wouldn't be so bad if... THE DATA WERE ACTUALLY UNLIMITED.
I'm not sure what merited the harsh language. But yes that is a lot to ask for because the telecommunications companies have to pay multiple-billions in spectrum fees, towers set up, and software maintenance to spread a 3G signal. So yes they are going to charge a premium for its use.
Anyone is free to set up their own 3G service and charge less for it, if they are so inclined.
On AT&T the data is unlimited.
UpDate: The part is now locked in Buy Buys' Geek Squad van as the technician went on vacation. But Best Buy already had a back-up plan. About 10 days ago they "over-nighted" a duplicate part that hasn't arrived yet. I am in a major U.S. city. They promise to "overnight" another one. That should leave 19 in inventory. Best buy?
That's why, after you buy your phone, if you have a problem, you bring it to an Apple store, assuming you can get to one of course.
I bought a DCS range about 6 years ago. Apparently, from shipping this (it weighs 650 pounds) one of the silicon carbide gas starters broke. I didn't even bother with the place where I bought it. I called DCS up directly. They sent me the part, I removed the front panel, and replaced it myself.
Not everyone can do that, but if it's a choice, I always choose it first.
It's not like I need to increase my post count.
A lot of guys seem to love knocking BB, but it's not that simple.
If Apple is happy with the results of their new relationship with BB, because they are selling a lot of Macs there, as by accounts they are doing, and if BB is happy with Apple to the point of expanding the number of Apple stores within the premises at a faster rate than was expected, then it means that things are working out well.
I've been to a number of BB's, and have looked at the Apple stores. They are anywhere from not too busy, to very busy. I see sales people helping people, showing them the machines and software, answering questions. I haven't seen any problems.
The few salespeople working in the Apple stores there that I have spoken to have told me that the stores are doing well, and that they were trained, and that some actually work for Apple itself.
As BB likely makes more money from selling Apple products, because of the average selling price at least, there is no way that they will push PC's instead. This store within a store concept that Apple first did with CompUsa costs a lot of money to both Apple and BB. There's no way they will allow that money to be thrown away.
The world has changed. People who used to ride me hard for having Macs are now interested, or have already switched themselves. Because of that, when walking into a BB, you no longer get that "Apple what?" look.
Even when I'm in a PC only computer store buying something, and I'm asked which computer I have, I now get an interested look, or an "ah!", rather than the disdainful look, or disparaging remark that was common until a couple of years ago. I find the same thing to be true at BB.
I don't usually quote an entire long post to reference, but every word of this is golden. I could have written it myself.
I have helped a couple times recently at the Apple Table in our local Best Buy, and the response was fine. More like "Oh really? It can do that? Cool." They weren't particularly knowledgeable about Macs, but not disdainful either, which was often the case in big box stores just a few years back.
And these days, so many self-proclaimed 'techie' folks (knowledgeable or not ;-) ) think the iPhone is golden that I think there's a good shot the sales people may actually encourage people to buy it. At a store that carries many brands and services, this could be a very good thing. We'll see.
It's a little of both. The bigger stores seem to have the phones, or so I've been told, but it's the time it takes to process each order that's holding sales back as well. If a sale takes a half hour to complete with the work on the account (having to explain service options to people etc.), activating the phone (or phones), then 95 sales equals 47.5 hours of sales time for the phones per store on average, per day. Thats a lot of time, and there are only so many people in each store who can do that at once.
Thanks, Mel. I did not realize that the bottleneck was in the setting up of the account.
I wonder if these problems are there with the at&t stores too? Or if they have full availability. I suspect that I would rather buy from an Apple Store all things being considered--but not if there was a 2 hour wait!
I think you can assume where there are long lines...... there is not short supply.
Well, that is far from the only possibility. People could line up in the morning to be sure to get one before the day's allotment is sold out or something like that.
In other words, the stores that are out of them have either really short lines or long lines of really stupid people.
Maybe or maybe not, but still a funny image.
Maybe or maybe not, but still a funny image.
The one thing learned from The Soviet System, the longer the line the better the item you get when you get to the front of the line. So if you walk by an Apple store and see a long line out in front and the AT&T store has no line, then OBVIOUSLY the iPhone you get at the Apple store must be better!
Reminds me, when Mcdonalds opened their first store in Moscow, they had to keep an employee out in front at the end of the lines for the cash registers. If they had 5 registers open and each had 5 people in line, and by general movement if you ever ended up with 7 or 8 in one of the lines, people would start going to THAT line thinking somehow that it must have something better at the counter because it was a longer line. So they needed to dedicate an employee at lunch time to explain... "No, really! Every line has the same stuff. You can get anything you want at any of the lines! Really!"
So if you see a long line at the Apple store, the store probably has iPhones.
(unless you hear a lot of Russian being spoken by the people in line and maybe they're waiting for toilet paper......)
I think you can assume where there are long lines...... there is not short supply.
I'm sorry. I just read this line in isolation quoted in my previous post and it just seemed so much more absurd. One of the surest ways to generate long lines is constrain supply.
Go back to some of the most enduring images of the end of the Soviet Union and that was all you would see--long lines at stores with bare shelves.
The one thing learned from The Soviet System, the longer the line the better the item you get when you get to the front of the line.
Wow, we went for the same reference at the same time.
Problem is, it sounds like you have personal experience with it so I better tread carefully!
I'm sorry. I just read this line in isolation quoted in my previous post and it just seemed so much more absurd. One of the surest ways to generate long lines is constrain supply.
Go back to some of the most enduring images of the end of the Soviet Union and that was all you would see--long lines at stores with bare shelves.
Yes, but at the Apple store it's simple.
When the iPhone is gone..... so is the line.
The line is caused less by low supply as it is by slow activations and high demand.
There are stores that have had a line from the minute they open in the morning until the minute they close, without running out of product. The supply is contrained mostly by the activation times in that case. If Apple really could have 25 people in the store dedicated to signing up iPhone customers they could probably eliminate the lines. But I think the bottleneck is caused by the time it takes to activate and not by the lack of supply.
There are contrained by supply, I know and agree.
But if they plunked down another 5 million phones this weekend, the lines would keep plugging away slowly even though they had the product.
Does show just how good last years approach worked compared to the AT&T approach.
Reminds me, when Mcdonalds opened their first store in Moscow, they had to keep an employee out in front at the end of the lines for the cash registers. If they had 5 registers open and each had 5 people in line, and by general movement if you ever ended up with 7 or 8 in one of the lines, people would start going to THAT line thinking somehow that it must have something better at the counter because it was a longer line. So they needed to dedicate an employee at lunch time to explain... "No, really! Every line has the same stuff. You can get anything you want at any of the lines! Really!"
This is a great image as well. To someone whose culture has always shown them stores will ample supply, their actions seem ridiculous. But they were simply following the logic of a different system--not being stupid.
I fail to believe that there are many people in the US these days who would make the same mistake...
[edit]
Sorry trying to type with a fussy baby--killing my typing and my thinking.
Rest assured, I get that the iPhone's lines at Apple stores are due to the activation process. You and Mel have cleared it up for me. I was getting sidetracked by ancillary issues...