Macs at BestBuy.com Pulled

[MacRumors]

It appears the posting of Apple laptops at BestBuy may have been premature.

BestBuy.com (http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?id=cat01174&navHistory=cat00000%2Bcat01000%2Bcat01002&type=category&navLevel=4) has removed those items from their online store. The store listed PowerBooks and iBooks yesterday, and also offered a store-wide $150 rebate (until August 9th) on Laptops.

The official launch (http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2003/07/20030730145443.shtml) is expected to be August 10th, 2003, but many BestBuy store locations are already carrying the Apple products.

[arn]

Was anyone actually able to order a Laptop before they got pulled?

arn

[jaedreth]

Well, if Apple *were* going to announce products tomorrow, this kind of action might be taken. But then again, if Apple got pissed at BestBuy and said forgetit-TM (or something worse), then this kind of action might also be taken.

So this event could be VeryGood-TM, or VeryveryBad-TM.

Jaedreth

[barbaloot]

Best Buy also forgot to rebuild their search database. If you do a search for Apple. "Apple® PowerBook® G4 with 15.2" Display M8858LL/A" comes up.

[arn]

Originally posted by jaedreth
Well, if Apple *were* going to announce products tomorrow, this kind of action might be taken.

nah... it means nothing with regard to new-powerbook-releases.

Contrary to popular thought, retailers have very little knowledge of upcoming releases.

arn

[applemacdude]

How long where the powerbooks up on bestbuy.com?

[arn]

Originally posted by applemacdude
How long where the powerbooks up on bestbuy.com?

Just 1 day.

arn

[nagromme]

Sounds like a mistake was made, Apple products were offered too soon, and now that's been corrected. No big deal, maybe, but I think it may be a GOOD thing:

There were reports of some Besy Buys putting out Macs before there was an Apple Rep on hand. Nobody knew about them, there were no demos running--the usual.

If someone jumped the gun, then I'm glad they caught it and fixed the problem. Better to put those Macs away and wait for the REAL roll-out as agreed with Apple.

This assumes that products would be pulled from stores and the site at the same time. (Otherwise, this tells us nothing about retail stores.)

In any case, stores AND the site are sure to be selling Macs soon anyway.

[Stelliform]

This isn't the first time Best Buy on-line has messed up. They once offered a video card for hundreds off of the retail price.... That time they just cancelled the orders for the mis-priced item.

[Mudbug]

sounds like another case of premature specification, as Steve Jobs put it. I think they just went live with the info before they should have, and probably noone would have caught it if we hadn't all popped to that page and made a spike in their web traffic.

[iPC]

BestBuy is so good at this retail thing... :rolleyes:

[tazznb]

NOOOOOOOooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!

*sniffle*

[boalter]

I think there are other reasons for them pulling the Macs, I don't think it was premature.

I got a chance to look at the pages, and the 12" PowerBook and the iBook had store pickup available, and 3 stores within 15 miles of me had stock. I also looked at the rebate info, and the $150 rebate is ONLY for this week, the 3rd-9th.

If this was done prematurely, they wouldn't have taken the time to put the rebate form online, considering the rebate expires before the "official" launch of Aug. 10th. I don't think they would have activated store pickup either.

[vrapan]

how about they had such a huge number of orders trying to take advantage of the 150$ rebate that Apple doesn't have enough stock due to NEW PBs Coming LOL. Just a joke guys I have been enjoying my 12" PB a few months now and it is funny to be jumping on the smallest non hint about new PBs :-)

[jaedreth]

Actually, you might be onto something there.

Jaedreth

[vrapan]

If I am proven to be right I want to be credited as the first guy to say it LOL ;-) I hope they come guys I might not be getting one for another year or so but I am as excited as everyone that wants one. :D

[MrMacMan]

Yeah $150 Off normal 'apple' price could be deadly for apple bottom line...

;)


Ech, When does the $150 Off Offer end?

10:1 I bet tomorrow.

[edStar]

I wish they would offer some macs in retail chains in Australia. I bet they could move a couple of macs if they were in places like Officeworks .. where a lot of people buy HP and Compaq computers. Interestingly they don't sell Dell ones. Or even Harvey Norman another popular, massive retail chain that sells products at inflated prices.

BTW, Apple Australia recieved a new CEO (I think that's his title) and has done some work for Dell and knows the educational side pretty well. Maybe we will see a few changes from Apple Australia?? Like the ability to print those iphoto books!! :)

[Angelus520]

I stopped into Best Buy today and took a look for myself at what they have. A 12" and 15" PowerBook, both w/ SuperDrive, an iBook, a 1.25 Ghz PowerMac, a 17" Display, a 17" iMac, and an eMac. Not a bad bit of display, though they did have the security bars in place on the laptops so I could hardly read the Dock.

And they were all fired up and ready to use, though none of them had iTunes in the Dock. Had to add that myself ;-) Of course they didn't actually have anything in iTunes. And someone had messed with the resolution on the iMac so I had to put it back to normal. They'd put it on 1024x768 stretched or something goofy like that.

And no one really knew much about them. Had the guys running around asking if they could help but I doubt they could have.

Some people were checking them out, but most kept walking on by. I don't see how they can just walk on by a 17" Apple display and not stop and check it out. It's like ignoring Monica Bellucci in a bikini on a beach. Okay, so maybe not quite, but I still cannot fathom people ignoring them.

Nice to see them up close, though. I'd never realized how small the 12" PowerBook was. Still like my 15" TiBook.

[jxyama]

i doubt anything new is coming... (i mean, this should not be taken as something new is coming from apple...)

best buy did the same thing and jumped the gun for 3g ipod back in late-April. some of us posted about seeing (and actually getting) the ipod a few days before apple "unveiled" them at their retail stores...

i'm just guessing that apple told them to drop it online...

[oldskool]

Finally broke down today and ordered a 14" iBook from the Canadian Apple store for my SO (she's a teacher) and noticed that the price had dropped by CAD$75 from the weekend. Nice.

Haven't compared before/after prices on other schwag, but I did notice that the 12" PB with Combo drive is now same price as 14" iBook with combo that I ordered: CAD$1999 (with educational discount).

[arn]

Originally posted by boalter
If this was done prematurely, they wouldn't have taken the time to put the rebate form online, considering the rebate expires before the "official" launch of Aug. 10th. I don't think they would have activated store pickup either.

The only flaw in your theory is that the $150 rebate is not Apple specific. It's for all laptops, and remains in effect.

arn

[solvs]

Originally posted by oldskool
Finally broke down today and ordered a 14" iBook from the Canadian Apple store for my SO (she's a teacher) and noticed that the price had dropped by CAD$75 from the weekend. Nice.

Haven't compared before/after prices on other schwag, but I did notice that the 12" PB with Combo drive is now same price as 14" iBook with combo that I ordered: CAD$1999 (with educational discount).

I think you have like 10 days to get the difference. Call them and see.

[puterfreak555]

Okay, this morning we were informed (acutally the supervisors were) that the site was going down. They did not tell why. I'm guessing that it was this update. There is very little known at my product specialist level (and any higher for that matter they are all idiots). I am not happy about this move to having Macs at BB. I talked to a few PCHO's (PC Home Office...that's what they call themselves) and they are not happy about selling Apple products. It gets me very upset. I am a Digital Imaging guy and sell cameras and love telling people that "It will work fine with iPhoto...oh you have windows 98...Yeah it will work but you have to install all their software and stuff first." I'll post more when we get it. From inside our employee toolkit on the computer system not much comes up when searching for "powerbook". Just a lot of ram. It doesn't look like anything was updated there yet. I'll check again later this week though.

[legion]

I checked the three Best Buys near me (yeah, we have a bit of a glut of stores) and none of them are carrying any Macs, though they've always had the iPods (even during the reselling-licensing debacle that happened recently.)

On the otherhand, I've 2 Apple Stores nearby, about 10 mins to one and 15 min to get to the Flagship Apple Store. Ok, so I shouldn't complain about the lack of BestBuy merchandise:D


It's nice living in a big city...

(I just dropped by one of the Apple Stores... doesn't look like they're prepping for new PBs:rolleyes: )

[Centris 650]

I had gone to one of the Best Buy stores near me. The guy there was telling me he didn't know that BB would be selling Apples anywhere. When I told him that there were stores selling them he then told me that I needed to keep checking BestBuy.com because when they were available online then they'd be available at all BB stores.

Maybe the site was pulled because not every store is selling yet?

OBTW, he didn't speak very highly of Apple nor did he know the name of "that all in one colored computer they came out with a few years ago." (the iMac, duh!) He also refered to Apple's new generation computer as the G4.

Sigh

[legion]

:confused: I thought the word from BB (and Apple) was that this was a test program and in only certain markets/stores, which would mean:

A. Not all BB will be carrying Macs even if the online store does.

B. The online store is probably considered internally as a "store" (dealt with in a B&M sense) or a separate div, and therefore under a different agreement with Apple.

Either way, the S.C. BB guy that Centris 650 had to deal with is wrong...

[Rasmuskl]

Originally posted by puterfreak555
I talked to a few PCHO's (PC Home Office...that's what they call themselves) and they are not happy about selling Apple products. It gets me very upset.

You have people calling themselves PeeCee Ho's. How appropriate.

Anyways, stopped by the BB on Lex & 86th in Manhattan yesterday.
They had beautiful macs there.
But what a shame.
The 12" PB had not been setup, so i took it upon myself to set it up. Could not even register cause they had no online access.

There was no charger for the two other laptops (TiBook and Ibook) so they were dyeing.
Also a PeeCee Ho (i really like that expression now) put a price tag by the Ibook while i was there. Only the price tag happend to be for the 12" PB.

Come On apple educate these whores. Or get some reps there or else this will just crash and burn again.
Apples are much less attractive to people if they are dead. And you can't really enjoy the fun of the iapps if there is nothing to work with.
Throw a few stock photos into iphoto a couple of tunes into itunes or set them all up with airport so that people can atleast browse and see ITMS.

And if anyone here works at BB, prep those Macs.
Shove those PeeCee Hos aside and set those ababies up.

[bwintx]

Originally posted by Rasmuskl
You have people calling themselves PeeCee Ho's. How appropriate.

(Snort) LOL! :p