Apple Store Stanford Shopping Center

Apple Store Stanford Shopping Center, was the first Apple "mini" concept retail store in the world located at Stanford Shopping Center in Palo Alto, California.

tore history

The Apple Store mini concept called for stores that were significantly smaller than the traditional Apple Stores but would sell a similar volume as their larger cousins. The Stanford store was originally planned to open as the first and flagship mini store with others to follow. The Stanford store was revealed to the press at a special "sneak peek" press conference hosted by Steve Jobs two days before the official grand opening making it the first mini store to be viewed by the public. The store was initially slated to open as the first mini store however due to construction delays it was pushed back to open along with its five other sibling mini stores. It is still considered by Apple to be the first of the mini stores and is the store featured in all of Apple's advertisements and promotional material featuring the mini stores. It was also the mini store Steve Jobs decided to visit on the opening day. The Stanford Apple store to date is the only one that is an outdoor store that is nominally independent from a mall.

The store opened October 16, 2004 to mixed reviews. The public and Apple immediately noticed several problems with the concept. The floor, which had been laid just days prior to opening, was made of an epoxy resin similar to aircraft hangars and was pure white. Shoe and scuff marks quickly accumulated giving the store a very dirty look. Additionally the store's walls were made of an imported Japanese steel that was similar in appearance to Apple's PowerBook line of computers. However unlike the Powerbooks, the store walls quickly accumulated smudge marks and hand prints from the oil on human hands. Finally the lighting was considered overbearing in the store and was quite jarring to any customers who entered the store, especially in the evenings. The store also did not open with the expected self check out kiosks for smaller products and has yet to have such kiosks installed. The stations designed for the kiosks remain normal cash registers, however they are poorly designed for the role. In addition Steve Jobs himself was disappointed with the floor design in particular.

The store has continued to be a testbed for the "mini" store concept after a redesign and rebuild that was completed in July of 2005. The epoxy floor was replaced with a stone floor common in larger Apple stores and a table was installed in the center of the store giving the Stanford mini store the ability to display the entire Apple product line, a first for the mini concept.

External links

* [http://www.apple.com/retail/stanford/ Apple Store Stanford Shopping Center official website]
* [http://www.ifoapplestore.com/ Apple Store info website]
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