Apple Store Staff/Cost Ratio?

G’day,

Probably been discussed before… or not… But -

Electrical goods retailers (eg JB Hi-Fi etc) sell Apple products that by all counts have low profit margins (to them). They also sell other manufacturers products, the may/may not have low margins. Their staff / cost ratio would, I imagine, be something like 1 floor staff to 20 customers (!?).

Apple Stores sell almost exclusively Apple products. Given they are owned by Apple Co directly, their profit margin on sales is probably higher than a wholesaler. However, they have a high staff / customer ratio - typically there is a very obvious blue-shirt presence amongst the customers.

I’ve heard that Apple Store staff are not paid great, but even so if you are running rosters with that many people on, that’s a huge running cost. How can Apple afford so many staff members?

Cheers

cosmic

When your share prices are worth twice the price of oil you can do whatever it is you feel like doing. They basically give free hardware to people who complain to much. What’s that tell you?

Apple has more money than it knows what to do with and it doesn’t care if its staff ratio is inefficient because its still basically printing money. They have that many blue shirts because the customer is always right, and will always be served efficiently.

That’s what keeps a happy Apple ecosystem.

Do they discount off RRP? Didn’t even consider visiting them when looking for my son’s iPad!!

I appreciate that they are essentially the biggest company on the planet at the moment… But even so, if they squander their money they’re surely just setting themselves up for failure.

To answer the later part of your post first, I don’t think Apple quite realises they are in the post Steve Jobs era, and that both Microsoft and Google are eating into their major markets quite rapidly at the moment. I also don’t think Tim Cook realises you can’t just get by with iPhones, or by improving the supply chain so it’s more efficent. Steve Cook is the Balmer of Apple and needs to move back to doing whatever it is he does best. He’s been shown not to be able to innovate. Neither Cook nor Balmer can see beyond the curve.

The same thing happened to Sony in the 90s and it took them 20 years to get over it and get back to whatever it is that they do best. Right now that’s class leading digital photography gear and the Sony PlayStation division.

Apple will do 10% of Apple gear if your son is a student. Staff members only get 15% The markups are not incredibly insane. What’s hurting Apple prices in Australia is the weak Australian dollar thanks to the Liberal Coalition.

There was a while where you could get 15% off through the Coop Bookshop, but they don’t do that deal anymore. Getting anymore through JB Hifi or whatever is usually pot luck where they are getting rid of stock that didn’t sell as well as expected.

Use the Apple Refurb thing, its basically the same product except it comes in an environmentally friendly brown cardboard box.

http://www.apple.com/au/shop/browse/home/specialdeals/mac

10% off… Shit! My wife put an iPad into the shopping cart on Apple Store AU - about $30 off I think - but the fine print said it was university/tertiary only, so we didn’t go through with it… I actually emailed Tim :slight_smile: and said the Edu discount should be extended to include primary schools because Apple have made their equipment so synonymous with education as to it becoming a requirement…

As for refurb - I was watching the store, but they only were getting 16GB machines, and my son’s requirements were 32+… :frowning:

I always thought the education pricing covered all schools. I may be out of the loop!

No way the retail stores would make a profit if they weren’t owned by Apple. Apple’s retail margin is 8 or 10% depending on whether you hit targets.

Apple retail is definitely subsided by either marketing budget or apples real profit margin around 20+%.

Shop at the Apple Store for Education and save on a new Mac and a new iPad. Education pricing is available to university students, students accepted into university, parents buying for university students, teachers, lecturers and staff at all levels.

This was what I read… :frowning:

Well, the best way to deal with this is to ring a store directly and ask what their policy is. Ever since they changed the Apple Store to what it is now online I don’t know what’s going on. You used to click through a maze that identified your school, and gave you the discount. They may have changed policy since, but you would have to ask them.

As it is with people, corporations don’t get to be monstrously wealthy by being loose with their money.

This is an old link and I’m not sure to what degree it’s changed but Apple has been by far the highest performing retailer in the US and I would imagine they probably still are. The stores are highly efficient and incredibly high performers.

Mmm.

So, their ace up their sleeves is the ability to not only close the deal but even persuade those not intending to purchase to do so… Hence all the happy-hands when people buy - creating hype…

It is pretty clear some people don’t run businesses. Apple’s market cap is huge because it makes money. A lot of money. You don’t make money by employing more people than you need. That is the fast way to making no money.

Apple stores employ a lot of people because they have a lot of traffic, very focussed traffic after what is almost exclusively high margin product that requires commensurate service that is built into and reflects expectations that come with that price.

I made the mistake of going into the Apple Store at Carindale today. Holy moley! There would have to be about fifty harried employees and probably three hundred customers in there. A zoo! But profit!

After watching a bit I also suspect after iPhone the MBA is still that store’s top seller on a unit basis by the way. Must be school buying season.

Its not a reflection of businesss I’m not in the business of running a tech hardware store. The IT thing is my past, I have no intention of going back there, it doesn’t entertain me in the same way as when I was a 16 through 24.

My point was a visceral one, any time I’ve been at the Apple Store and I’ve had an issue I’ve been in the position where you can bend them just enough to start throwing money at you. Rightly or wrongly that is what it is.

Sometimes I don’t have to say anything… My Apple TVs not working as expected. Oh hey yeah, we get how you feel we’ll take it out back, here’s a new one. There is a significant mantra there about keeping the customer happy regardless and thats my sentiments.

One of the reasons why I kept coming back was that mantra. What stops me now is that I’m in a different period of my life. I gave away some opportunities to do what I wanted to vs banging my head against a desk in an office cubicle wondering about what I was doing in life. I’m not in that market at the moment, I can’t afford a new Mac being a research graduate but I’m sure when I am back to by a new Mac not much will have changed.

It’s how they get people like me coming back to by new Macs for the last 15 or so odd years since I started out with the original G4 iMac as my first new out of the box Mac. Impeccable customer service with the value that the customer is always right regardless.

That’s what got me to buying the latest Apple TV when I didn’t really need it and why I keep coming back.

[quote=“cosmichobo, post:3, topic:3126”]
Do they discount off RRP? Didn’t even consider visiting them when looking for my son’s iPad!![/quote]

Yes,

Apple Stores, Will price match any advertise price from another physical retailer.
The Apple Online Store, Will price match from any online Australian retailer.

I just noticed this in my mail.

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The JB 10% off deal is so regular I don’t know why they don’t just make it permanent. Surely they only sell to idiots that don’t know any better during the non 10% off time.

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The only reason I posted that is because there’s someone here looking for a discount at the moment.

I always get 10% off at JB regardless of deals. :wink: Not difficult as long as you’re friendly and know what you want before you walk in.

The real Mac User are happy to pay full RRP that Apple asking for, 10% discount doesn’t save them a lot I guess, considering average Mac User have higher income compare with PC users.

@fbtn my family’s income put us just above the poverty line. I’ve never owned a PC.