Apple Store Genius Bars failed to attract the public when they were first set up, according to Ron Johnson, the former Apple Executive who helped set up the stores with Steve Jobs.
“No one came to the Genius Bar during the first years,” Johnson, now the CEO of J.C. Penney, wrote in a Harvard Business Review blog post on Monday. “We even had Evian water in refrigerators for customers to try to get them to sit down and spend time at the bar.” Johnson goes on to say that Apple stuck with the Genius Bars anyway because “we knew that face-to-face support was the very best way to help customers.”
“How do you explain the fact that people flock to the stores to buy Apple products at full price when Walart, BestBuy, and Target carry most of them, often discounted in various ways,” Johnson writes, “and Amazon carries them all — and doesn’t charge sales tax!”Within three years the bars were so popular the company had to introduce a reservation system.
He says it's "the experience" of the stores that attracts customers and the fact that staff are not on commission.
“How do you explain the fact that people flock to the stores to buy Apple products at full price when Walart, BestBuy, and Target carry most of them, often discounted in various ways,” Johnson writes, “and Amazon carries them all — and doesn’t charge sales tax!”
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