It's launching the shops in the US's biggest and trendiest shopping centres in a bid to expose the Mac to more consumers. Explaining the concept, Apple chief executive Steve Jobs said Apple currently has about 5 per cent of the market, or 25 million customers worldwide. BMW and Mercedes Benz do pretty well with 1.8 and 2.1 per cent, respectively. But Apple isn't settling for 5 per cent, Jobs says. They will feature demos of Macs running the creative applications at which Apple excels.
Location is all-important.
The first shop opened last week in McLean, a leafy Washington DC suburb that also houses the Central Intelligence Agency. Sounds a great idea - but don't hold your breath waiting for it to come to Australia's hip streets and lifestyle centres. Apple Australia planned something similar a few years back after pulling the Mac from Harvey Norman and other big retail stores. The first shop was to have been in Chatswood, Sydney. But the idea was dropped after dealers objected to a company-owned competitor.