AppleInsider | Best Buy rumored to add Apple Genius Bars, display more Macs in stores:

Best Buy later this year may update its Apple store-within-a-store boutiques to feature a larger display of Macs in addition to staffed Genius Bars that would mirror those found in every Apple retail store.


I'll admit that I've had a horrible experience looking at the new MacBook Air in a Best Buy. The guy knew nothing, wouldn't listen to me, and acted like he was selling me a used car. I've purchased two Macs and three iPods in the last two years, and been responsible for at least one more, I think. This isn't how you treat your best customers.

Still, I don't think I'm compensating by saying that making the Apple store larger in Best Buy is a little too much. Admittedly, that sort of Circuit City experience is part of the problem -- you can't control the Apple experience within a Best Buy. Circuit City, CompUSA, and now this: There is no store within a store. It just doesn't work. The host pawns off too much affect onto the remora.

And I'm not sure Macs are quite yet ready to burst. I wouldn't be surprised to see Macs slowly crawl upwards in PC sales, especially if the AppleTV as TV is released in the next few years. But as soon as Apple goes from boutique to line slop and doesn't produce line slop, eMachine numbers, somebody's going to be upset. If Apple was the main PC being purchased, they could conceivably turn the feel of a Best Buy into a positive Apple experience, the type that converts buyers. As a niche player, they're wasting their sway on footage that's not going to be useful.

Perhaps the Genius Bar in a Best Buy is meant to counteract the Best Buy affective dominance, but it's a losing battle. When Apple fights battles it wholly controls, it wins. You can't win inside of a Best Buy.

I ramble.

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