A few weeks ago, I found myself in the Apple Store in downtown Palo Alto. My mother-in-law wanted an iPod Shuffle. Now, I usually order my Apple gear online because I hate the Apple Store, but she wanted instant gratification, so we headed into the store.
In the store, she spent a few minutes deciding which color she wanted. When she selected the green one, we went to one of the info-iPads to get one brought to us. The system kept on returning errors, so we still had to find an unoccupied employee to get it. It took a few minutes to get someone’s attention. Once I told him what we wanted, he said that it would take “a few minutes”. While we were waiting, someone else approached that employee to get an iPhone accessory that wasn’t available on the store floor either.
About ten minutes later, my iPod Shuffle and the other person’s item came at the same time. The employee said to the other person, “do you mind if I ring her [indicating me] up first?” The other person said that yes, she did mind. I was unhappy since I had been waiting longer, but acquiesced because I knew that my transaction would take longer than usual1. Regardless, it’s bad customer service on the part of the employee to ignore the order in which we had placed our orders with him.
In all, what should have been a 10-minute transaction (including deciding on the color) ended up taking nearly 45 minutes. This is exactly why I hate the Apple Store: a quick transaction is never quick. I should’ve just gone to Target or Best Buy instead. While I would have forfeited the small discount I get on Apple hardware, I would have saved a lot of time.
- As a VMware employee, I get a small discount on Apple hardware, which would take a little bit of time for them to verify that I qualify for it and look up the code to use. ↩
I really don’t know what’s up with your particular Apple Store – I’ve never had a dedicated to actually purchasing something visit take 45 minutes. Even when I got my iPad on launch day, including line time, was less than that. Recent visits (previous MacBook Air in december and Mac mini a few weeks ago) that involved price matching another retailers discounts were under 10 minutes.
I’ve had this experience in more than the Apple Store closest to me. It’s not just one store.
I think it’s (at least partially) a function of the store’s popularity. Since the place is always stuffed full of people, it’s hard to get an employee’s attention. If the iPads aren’t working, you have to hope that you can catch someone. I’m not rude enough to barge into a conversation between an employee and another customer, and there’s no mechanism other than the iPads to be able to get someone’s attention.
I had a great experience at a small Apple Store in the Boston area a couple of years ago, but it was a Sunday night close to closing time, and thus nearly empty when I walked in. I didn’t have my badge or business cards with me, but they were willing to spend a couple of minutes looking up my blog and LinkedIn profile and accept those as proof that I was an employee of a company that gets Apple discounts. I was in and out of there in 10 minutes, and that included chatting about my then-employer. But that’s the exception, not the rule.
The Sydney (George St) store is certainly always popular too (about the only time you can see from one end to the other on any floor but the 3rd/genius level is when it’s closed), and yet I’ve always had prompt service – I’ve only once used the iPad-kiosk things to attract attention. I’ve also had good service in other Sydney stores, it’s been a few years since I was in either the SF or the London/Regent St store, so they may have gone down hill.
Of course, if I’m not in “need it now” or “must continue my 5 year streak of not paying full price for a Mac” mode then I prefer to buy online simply because going in to the CBD is something I tend to avoid. Plus I like getting deliveries at work 🙂
It’s funny how different the stores can be, yet seem so similar. Maybe it’s also some internal differences between the Australia stores and the US stores?