[UK] New Apple Premium Reseller in Maidstone, Kent

I thought fellow MR users might be interested to know that a new Apple Premium Reseller has opened a store in Maidstone, Kent.

(I'm in no way affiliated to the company - this is just for information).

It looks like a fairly slick operation from their website - http://www.stormfront.co.uk - and hopefully I'll get a chance to have a look at the store itself soon.

Useful for anyone who finds trekking up to the Apple Store at Bluewater to be a pain in the proverbial!

Nothing actually in Canterbury as far as I know (surprising, considering the high student population and relative economic status of the area). There are a couple of Apple Service Providers nearby though - one in Whitstable (ServiceWeb) and one in Ashford (Iconology Ltd).

I use Iconology to support my Mac Pro at home, and my studio machines at work - nice bunch of chaps.

Not much else in the way of resellers though, that's why the new Maidstone store is a big deal!

I visited the aforementioned Apple Premium Reseller in Maidstone today, with a colleague from work who's looking at buying an iMac or MBP for home. As I said the company is called Stormfront, and the store is very Apple-esque. Lots of simple, clean lines, glass and displays that make the products the star.

The staff were friendly, approachable and interested - but not pushy. I spoke to one of the senior people there and they were pleased to know they had a mention on MacRumors!

I found out Stormfront are also opening the store mentioned above in Canterbury very soon. It'll be in the Marlowe Arcade, part of the Whitefriars shopping quarter - right next to the bus station and Park and Ride drop-offs.

Off to a bad start

A friend of mine who's been teetering on the edge of Mac ownership for a while now finally decided to go and buy a Mac Pro 8-core (he wanted the top of the line model). I recommended Stormfront in Canterbury - and I'm beginning to wish I hadn't.

Saturday before last, Stormfront Canterbury didn't have the MP8 in stock, just the 4-core model because "no-one ever buys the 8-core", but they assured us they'd order it the following Monday and it would arrive the following Monday, allegedly sooner than if he ordered from Apple Online - despite not being a custom order - and they promised to keep my friend informed of progress.

The sales guy knew very little about the product he was selling, had difficulty opening the case (and once opened, didn't really know much about the insides), claiming that a Mac Pro could easily handle images of 60 million megapixels and run 8 monitors from one graphics card.

It has now been 10 days since the order was placed, and my friend has only had one phonecall from them, 2 days before it was supposed to be delivered, explaining that it might not turn up.

Today, having not had a further update, he called them - only to be told it was Apple's fault and there had been a shipping error.

I'm getting retail rage on behalf of my friend, who is spending £2,500+ on a premium product at an Apple Premium Reseller, and getting frankly lousy service.

To be fair to them, they did throw in a copy of MS Office for Mac Home/Student, plus £20 off AppleCare and 10% off Parallels 4.

But I find it hard to believe it takes 10 days to order and receive a standard spec MP8 when you're an APR, when a personal buyer can order the same spec direct from Apple Online with 24 hour shipping!

They are authorised to do Apple repairs under warranty, so can't see why not! Let us know if you have any luck