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Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

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Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#201

Post by WorldMaker »

gentleman11 wrote: post #168

Microsoft’s stores were very nice except that they had double the staff they needed and were using headsets to coordinate their sales efforts and pressure me into buying things... several of their main brands also had histories of installing spyware on their consumer devices which made me really uncomfortable and kept me from buying a couple of times (Lenovo, Dell, razer, another I forget)

Microsoft Stores actually had a policy that the PCs they sold were only allowed to have clean OS images ("Signature Edition" was the branding term), which means that it was the safest place to buy Lenovo/Dell/etc. You'd pay on average about $50 more than if you bought directly from Lenovo or Dell, but you'd have peace of mind that you wouldn't need to reinstall Windows to make sure that you had removed all the spyware/adware.

ETA: Which is maybe the biggest loss with the Microsoft Stores going away. You could point a relative at a Microsoft Store and not worry about any PC they picked, but any other store you'd need to expect to do a reinstall for them or worry about which specific brand name they picked.

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#202

Post by alexchantavy »

legitster wrote: post #198

Microsoft stores are (were?) magical places full of bizarre and weird devices. I actually had fun going in and seeing all sorts of gadgets and devices and playing with demos. A candy store for futurists. In comparison Apple stores are dystopian places full of rows of identical looking people looking at rows of identical beige phones. But I think it's pretty telling that I loved hanging out in them, but never spent an…

So funny that 10 years ago views about Microsoft and Apple were near the exact opposite of what you described here.

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#203

Post by scarface74 »

smoyer wrote: post #176

Apparently if you're not dramatically over-charging for your consumer technology products, you can't afford brick-and-mortar locations. Those who do pay for the premium platform should realize that not (nearly) all of the additional cost goes into product quality. Note that this discounts design superiority/inferiority.

By definition, if people are buying at the price that Apple sets at the margins Apple wants and there are alternatives, the product is not “overpriced”. That’s kind of Economics 101

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#204

Post by ryandrake »

blibble wrote: post #112
yellowstuff wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20121218-00/?p=58...

that's one of the pathetic excuses I've ever read they're an OS developer and they can't spend a day figuring out a floating point bug? maybe redirect some of the time integrating Candy Crush

The follow-up on open sourcing the code was also unhelpful:

> Hey everybody asking that the source code be released: The source code was licensed from another company. If you want the source code, you have to go ask them.

OK, which company?

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#205

Post by WorldMaker »

blntechie wrote: post #76
neilsimp1 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same. Wondering if it is a regional thing? Never in my life have I heard of or seen a Microsoft store.

They were almost in every major US city or their suburbs I think. In suburbs, they were predominantly in malls.

Pretty much every US city with an Apple Store had at least the mall kiosk version of the Microsoft Store, almost always within earshot or horizon distance from the Apple Store "coincidentally".

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#206

Post by 0xffff2 »

baybal2 wrote: post #54
mytherin wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looks more to me like they are giving up on their Surface line-up specifically, rather than all their consumer focused products. The Microsoft stores & Surface line was Microsoft's attempt at copying Apple with expensive devices with solid build quality and good support. It saw some success but apparently not enough.

> expensive devices with solid build quality and good support. The part in the middle was definitely missing

Are you saying the build quality wasn't solid on the Surface lineup? That doesn't match my experience at all.

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#207

Post by dingaling »

pwinnski wrote: post #132
gipp wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but a large portion of the Apple store crowds has always been people just hanging around and goofing off on the laptops. IIRC it's policy in those places to always let people do that however long they want, even if there's clearly no intent to buy anything. I've always wondered what portion of those crowds are actually customers. EDIT: Yes, everyone, I understand the marketing and lifetime-value reasons for doi…

Apple retails stores top every list of revenue per square foot. It's not even close[0]. Crowds may be anecdotal, but the crowds clearly do translate into revenue for Apple. The link spells out revenue per square foot for Apple as $5546, vs an average of $325. Second and third places bring in $3721 and $2951 per square foot. [0] https://chainstoreage.com/news/most-profitable-retailers-sal...

"The record for the greatest sales in relation to area of selling space is held by Richer Sounds plc, a British hi-fi retail chain. Sales at its branch in London Bridge Walk reached a peak of £195,426/m² ($27,830/ft²) for the financial year ending 31 January 1994."

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#208

Post by mixmastamyk »

ptero wrote: post #155
simonh wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really see the connection. If the only traffic to the stores was a handful of people, how can this have any significant effect on customer good will? They can't be both empty and influential. It seems like the stores were a missed opportunity, but they always had the odds stacked against them. Whatever you can get in an MS store, you could get a much cheaper alternative running the same software at another el…

> It seems like the stores were a missed opportunity, but they always had the odds stacked against them. Odds were against Microsoft stores being profitable because Microsoft is now an underdog in consumer tech. If you want hardware (possibly with the exception of xbox; I just do not know, never had one), Microsoft is rarely the name that jumps to mind. But this is exactly why Microsoft should keep them (using some p…

They did that when they failed/gave up the phone business. Affected MS retail in the long term. Pulled out one leg from the stool, metaphorically.

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#209

Post by rschapman »

josephpmay wrote: post #16

I think one point people are missing: Apple stores, even if they exist mainly to promote the brand, are MASSIVELY profitable. In fact, they are one of the most profitable store chains in the world. By contract, I believe that Microsoft was always running most of their stores at a loss. Even for a massive company like Microsoft, continuously running an unprofitable division is hard to maintain.

That's interesting to hear. Do you have inside knowledge on that? A former colleague in the HR space worked for Apple retail said that many of them were actually not profitable on the whole. They served lots of purposes but most of the value was intangible and not revenue driven. She/I may be wrong but it's counter to what I was told.

Re: Microsoft to permanently close its retail stores

#210

Post by AlchemistCamp »

simonh wrote: post #111
muststopmyths wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same with the SF Westfield Center store. Great staff. It was a good place to check out various Surfaces in person as well. I will say, the surfaces/laptops side of the store was usually empty. Some kids playing with the Xbox or people at the counter getting help seemed to be the extent of traffic the past couple of years. They seem to be aggressively destroying any paltry remaining goodwill with consumer enthusiasts.…

I don't really see the connection. If the only traffic to the stores was a handful of people, how can this have any significant effect on customer good will? They can't be both empty and influential. It seems like the stores were a missed opportunity, but they always had the odds stacked against them. Whatever you can get in an MS store, you could get a much cheaper alternative running the same software at another el…

I used to check out the Surfaces as I walked by the windows of that store and for a while considered buying one. I didn't but it did have a (mildly) positive on my perception of MS while I lived in SF.
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