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Best Buy To Carve Out Space For Microsoft Stores
UnknowingFool writes "Best Buy and Microsoft will launch 600 Microsoft stores within Best Buy retail locations in a store-within-a-store concept. The Microsoft stores will occupy 1500-2000 sq ft within each location. The terms of the deal are not announced, but I assume it benefits both as Best Buy would likely charge rent to help with declining revenue. For Microsoft, they may get cheaper facilities than building their own stores. The last I heard, MS had a very ambitious plan to launch hundreds of stores a year. I have doubts about the success of this venture, considering anecdotally almost every MS store I've seen in my travels was nearly empty. Since they all were located near Apple stores, the stark difference in foot traffic was apparent. The only exception was the MS store near Redmond, which had a decent crowd."
Now they just need a decent product to sell in that store-within-a-store.
Microsoft seems to have this strange idea that their name carries as much weight as Apple's in the public eye. People go to the Apple Store because Apple knows their products inside-out and in the eyes of their customers, the products sell themselves.
Microsoft, on the other hand, has users that use their products because they think they have to, and has no way to match Apple's ability to offer the entire current Apple world under one small roof.
If Microsoft wants to be the company that people are excited to see what their new product will be, they've got a long way to go towards repairing their image. They'll have to become an innovative company that brings new things to the table. And no, I don't mean support for new things that someone announced something just like it months or years ago.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
I heard you like electronics stores so we put an electronics store in an electronics store so you can impulse-buy while you're impulse-buying.
I'm waiting for the Starbucks inside the Microsoft Store inside the Best Buy.
N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
A couple weeks ago, I walked by a Microsoft store. First time I'd seen one. It looked nice and peaceful, a respite from the crowds of shoppers outside.
I am not a crackpot.
I think this is clearly a sign that the old "Big Box" stores of the 90s and 00s are on the way out. Best Buy is slowly realizing that they'll never be able to compete with Amazon on price, and they don't want to serve as Amazon's showroom, where customers check out the products and head online to actually buy it. But they realize this trend, and how Apple can have a showroom in their Apple stores, and not care if someone ultimately buys it in the Apple store or on Apple.com (or even an Apple product in Best Buy) -- Apple gets paid either way. So by teaming with Microsoft to get them to put a store inside their store, they get to charge them rent, and Microsoft gets paid whether the customer buys the Microsoft product in the store or later on online. I'd almost expect Best Buy to do this with other companies, like having a Sony Store inside, which would ultimately effectively make Best Buy a "mini-mall" of electronics instead of a stand-alone store competing against amazon and walmart (two companies that are difficult to compete against). Microsoft could be a guinea pig here.
That would have to be either a very large Best Buy store or a really small isle. Do they have outlets in Polynesia?
Ezekiel 23:20
Haha you shop at BestBuy!
Everyone point and laugh!
BTW Would you like to buy a service plan with that ink cartridge or movie?
Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
Best Buy is OK for some stuff. For example, if you need a gold-plated HDMI monster cable which is officially certified for your video game console.