Bret Harris sends a detailed report of the iMac launch with notes on sales figures, USB availability and more. Love the comment at the close of the article :-)
"Mike,
I was one of several hundred User Group members that volunteered to help
Apple with the iMac Launch this past weekend. Note that the following
is my opinion and is influenced by my experience as a Mac Evangelist
since 1986.
First of all, if you haven't already heard, this past
weekend's iMac Launch was hugely successful. On Friday at Midnight,
over a dozen San Francisco Bay area retail stores opened to sell the
iMac including all 10 ComputerWare stores and the Elite Computers store
in Cupertino. Most of these customers showed-up to take possession of
pre-ordered units (not emphasized in press). It was reported that the
pre-orders, in large part, were 100% pre-paid, not just the required
$250 to hold. All week Apple was milking the local press for all it was
worth floating press releases for pre-order figures, etc.
The CompUSA stores here did not participate in the Midnight Madness festivities. I
worked at the CompUSA in Santa Clara (San Jose) along with three other
MUG members (2 of which were previous Apple Employees, talk about hard
core loyalty) and a contract sales winnie on the morning shift. The
Apple provided software demos were pretty good (B+). Unfortunately,
there was no internet connectivity for the sole iMac on demo [There was at the
Richmond iMac demo I reported on in Sunday's news-Mike]. After
all, this was the i (internet) Macintosh that came loaded with Explorer,
Netscape, Earthlink, and super easy internet set-up software.
Because of limited launch supply of the iMac from the Sacramento assembly
facility (running 3-shifts currently with managers on the assembly
line), the strategy was to un-box only a single unit at each store for
demo purposes (and sell all the rest). This relegated the four MUG
members to the position of shills (probably the intended use anyway).
No Apple employees showed-up to help but they may have been working
weekend delivery truck duty. The CompUSA sales people were periodically
calling-in to report sales and remaining stock quantities (inventory
management was tight). Only about 8 to 10 boxed iMacs were stacked in
the isle at any given time (always appeared that there weren't many
left). This had the affect of eliminating any sense of procrastination
on the part of buyers. Once somebody staked a claim on a box (impulse
buying), a CompUSA sales guy would hoof it out to the parking lot to
retrieve a shopping cart so they could safely transport their booty to
checkout.
It was reported that some retailers were only allocated 10 or
20 iMacs but I estimate that this CompUSA location sold about 80 over
the two days. I believe that more iMacs were sold at this store
Saturday and Sunday than all other Wintel desktops combined. CompUSA
headquarters was reported to have been "thrilled" by Saturday sales
across the United States. I did not witness the sale of any other Apple
desktops or towers during the weekend.
The concentrated retail channel strategy seems to be paying off as
a big win for all parties including the consumer. All retailers have
stuck to the firm (good margin) list price of $1299 for the standard iMac
and Apple (evidently) will refrain from offering the iMac through the
online Apple Store for two months further incentivising the retail
channel to push the iMac hard and fast.
Many retailers offer special promotions that add value to the
iMac purchase such as additional 32MB of memory free, for example.
ComputerWare offers Performa Users, a targeted customer for the iMac, a
trade-in value of about $225 for their old 68000 Mac Performa.
There weren't any third party vendors demo-ing anything during the launch, as
Apple had desired and planned for, but this was because USB adapter kits
and USB peripherals with Mac Drivers aren't available yet. The only
printer that will work with the iMac today is the Epson Stylus 600 but
evidently there are problems with the driver that currently ships with
the $50 USB interface kit (oops). CompUSA did not think to hook-up
their demo Stylus 600 to the iMac. Also, the iMation SuperDisk was not
available for demo or sale at the store, which could have helped with
the "floppy question". Floppy dependent Performa users (targeted for
migration to iMac) lacking etherent are stuck trying to engineer a
workable scheme for migrating to the iMac.
So why did Apple launch the iMac now? The answer is timing.
It had to be launched now to catch "new school year" sales.
Based on what I witnessed, here are my estimates for iMac sales thus far:
50/50 Male/Female buyers, mostly middle to upper class White and Asian
background, 0% corporate sales, 50% of sales to a mixed-platform household,
20% Mac users who defected to the dark side and are now coming back home,
60% of all sales justified as "for use by students in new school year", 0% sales to
experienced WINTEL users (we had a bouncer at the door for these guys
anyway), 15% of sales to first-time/unsophisticatted personal computer
users (retirement age) for purposes of easy internet access (finances
tracking).
Some customers came from as far as 150 miles away because
other stores had sold out and they were directed to this store.
Although unconfirmed, it was reported that stores that ran out of floor
stock dipped into pre-sold inventory to maximize launch sales. So if
you paid for your iMac several weeks ago and did not race in to pick it
up, you be waiting a few more days for it (relax, they'll make more).
Finally, in the rumor department, Apple may come out with varied color
schemes of the iMac (next year?), mysterious expansion slot to be
explained, possible big brother 17" model. My favorite experience of
the two-day event was when an elderly man made his way in the front
door, past the iMac demo croud and past a line of iMac buyers winding
toward checkout to me, wearing my Macintosh "Think Different" polo shirt
and asked "This is my first time in a CompUSA store, do you guys sell
computers other than Macintosh?".
Cheers,
Bret Harris"
