I hope this is not my legacy

I was in Birmingham at the weekend with R- we were going to see deftones play at the Academy. Beforehand we decided to stop in at the Bullring and have a wander around, and it was here I decided that being a Mac user, I should really break my Apple store virginity and go and see what they are all about. I’ve always avoided them in the past because they are always really really busy and I’ve never really been interested in buying anything. I wasn’t particularly interested in buying anything on Saturday, but nevertheless felt somehow qualified to enter.

My experience of the store was slightly strange. About half of the store is taken up by the various electronic products they sell and an absolute sea of people doing one of two things- looking at the Apple homepage, or checking their facebook page. The second half of the store is split into one section for people getting help using their own products and getting things fixed, and another section for accessories and software. The latter section of the store was empty. There was one guy doing some sort of console hacking on a MacBook Pro near the entrance, who was promptly removed from the store and that resonated with a story I saw online about a guy who went into an Apple retail store and applied a jailbreak patch to all of the iPhone 4′s on display.

It is a really interesting place though- loads of people with no intention of buying anything are totally welcome to browse and play with the products. Why? Because they are the ones creating this overwhelming feel of excitement and desire for the products, which is infectious for the few people in the store with enough cash to buy things. I guess the image they create is really distinct from the elitist image which they could go for. Apple aren’t saying that only the special few are welcome and trying to keep the store clear for them (like, for example, a prestige car showroom or fine jewellers)- they are saying here are products which everyone wants but are still compromise free (which is, of course, incorrect).

I’ve never really liked the hype around Apple product releases, something which I was reminded of this week with the Beatles release announcement. To be honest I couldn’t have been more underwhelmed by the news, but I did breathe a sigh of relief that they announcement wasn’t that there would be an imminent replacement to the Macbook Pro 13″ I just bought! I think that the marketing department for the Beatles should be commended for their terrific negotiating skills, and for getting the X Factor to do a themed night to coincide with the release. However I think Apple made a mistake with the deal.

Apple generate tremendous amounts of publicity for their products by calling elaborate press conferences (sorry, ‘key notes’) where Steve Jobs stands up and announces the next life changing gadget that everybody must own. This generally generates a massive amount of discussion from the tech blogs, and along with a glossy advertising campaign and an army of fan boys telling all their friends, a new product is born. I don’t think strategy is incredibly clever, but I do think that it is immaculately executed. The products are just right (which is the really hard bit), they are well engineered and aimed at a specific market, and that market happens to respond well to the aforementioned marketing. Apple provide the total package from product to purchasing experience to support- the packaging is amazingly tactile, the aforementioned stores allow free reign on the products, and the aftercare is great.

Where I think that Apple have gone wrong is to sell out this marketing channel they have created to a third party, The Beatles. The music is not a product of Apple, they simply make a profit from selling it. Perhaps Steve Jobs really likes The Beatles’ music and wants to promote it but, well, I don’t care. I don’t want a biased music store which favours one band over another, even, no, especially a band which pays more. They make a good profit selling a lot of different products, but I don’t expect an email telling me to expect a life changing experience every time they get a new piece of stock. Please do not repeat.