Apple Merges Apple.com Website and Online Store

[MacRumors]

Apple made a significant change to its online presence today, merging its Apple.com website with its once-separate online store, to create one main website. There is no longer a standalone store.apple.com website that is used for making purchases, and the "Store" tab that was once at the top of Apple.com has been removed.

Instead, there's a universal shopping bag icon that displays products in the shopping cart, past order information, account details, and favorites. Purchasing an item is now done by clicking the "Buy" button on each individual product page, which links to the same purchasing menus that were present in the online store.

Apple's main site includes direct links to Mac, iPad, iPhone, Watch, Music, and Support. Despite the major integration, Apple's main site is largely unchanged, as are the product pages. Locating accessories is somewhat more difficult, however, with the removal of the central store site and the lack of dedicated store sections. Accessing accessories is largely done by visiting the main product sections and clicking on banners like "Accessories for Apple Watch" and "Accessories for iPhone."

Apple's integrated online store streamlines the shopping experience. Instead of viewing information about a product on the main site and then having to click over to the store, everything is now done in the same place.

In a statement given to TechCrunch, an Apple spokesperson said the change was done in an effort to create a simpler site for customers to learn about and shop for products.

"We redesigned Apple.com knowing that our customers want to explore, research and shop in one place," said an Apple spokesperson in a statement. "The new Apple.com takes the very best of our existing site and our online store to give customers one simple destination to learn and buy without navigating between two different sites. We've also improved several of the site's features to make shopping easier than ever for our customers."

The changes to the Apple.com site were made this afternoon and are live in the United States and several additional countries.

Article Link: Apple Merges Apple.com Website and Online Store

 

[doug in albq]

I will have to investigate as to how one gets to the refurbished section/area now...

EDIT: Same place...its in the footer of most product pages.

 

[ErikGrim]

This makes a lot of sense. The need for a separate online store was more of a technical decision based on the difficulty of dealing with WebObjects back in the day.

 

[ant_s]

Does this mean the whole site goes down now when they launch a new product?

 

[scottish]

So now the entire website will go down when they do major product updates?!

 

[myrtlebee]

The navigation bar is way too dark and contrasts too much with the content.

 

[DBZmusicboy01]

I guess so -___- way to go silly apples

 

[kmj2318]

It sounds like it's much harder to get to accessors, speakers, iPods, etc. Basically any product that doesn't have its own tab.

 

[commander.data]

Does this mean the whole site goes down now when they launch a new product?

They probably will just disable or remove all the buy links.

 

[Laird Knox]

Why a shopping bag? I thought it was a clipboard at first glance.

 

[nfl46]

Wow, great job, Apple! The website looks pretty damn good!

 

[Haynzee]

Holy crap well done Apple for making your website responsive! Welcome to 2010!

 

[cycomiko]

Man... thats almost Verge level browser performance trashing web page production

 

[haydn!]

...until they see a decline in accessory sales.

Overall, makes sense, but they need to make the smaller "impulse" buys more prominent.

 

[theelysium]

It is going to suck. All of their new minimal designs are horrid.

 

[Lazy]

Does this mean the whole site goes down now when they launch a new product?

Well it'll be better in that the entire store won't have to go down -- just the buying ability for the products getting updated.

I'd guess the "Buy" button(s) for affected products would be disabled and/or replaced with the back soon message.

 

[HenryDJP]

The navigation bar is way too dark and contrasts too much with the content.

I started to post the usual "In Before Somebody Complains about basically nothing important".....

 

[Moonjumper]

Everything is appearing massive on my Mac screen. Endless scrolling. Sometimes I cannot even see whole objects at once. Endless scrolling. Oversized objects are a bad internet fashion. Endless scrolling. The new Apple website takes it even further. Endless scrolling. No! Endless scrolling. I got a bigger screen to see more, not to have large images and the same content. I don't like endless scrolling.

 

[errant]

LOL @ this being described in the story as a "significant change"

 

[MacFan782040]

How do you navigate to buy an iPod?

 

[myrtlebee]

I started to post the usual "In Before Somebody Complains about basically nothing important".....

It was a site reDESIGN. I am commenting on an aspect of the design I think could be improved upon. In my opinion, as someone with a bachelors degree in Art & Design, it is way too heavy of a design element among all of the white of both the rest of the site and the navigation bars in Safari. Maybe I should post more to your liking in the future and just say "Yay, Apple! Circlejerk!"

 

[ErikGrim]

It sounds like it's much harder to get to accessors, speakers, iPods, etc. Basically any product that doesn't have its own tab.

It's one tab down from either Mac, iPad or iPhone.

If you want the all accessories page there's a dropdown for it. Or just go here: http://www.apple.com/au-hed/shop/accessories/all-accessories

 

[davidwells]

Remember when Apple products simply "just worked"? Now it's "What's this do?" & "Where's the thing that was always here?" Is that a clipboard, roll-on or what? It appears style is edging out function both here, iTunes, Music... just about everywhere.

I miss the old Apple. The one that just worked.

 

[ErikGrim]

How do you navigate to buy an iPod?

Bloody good question. The only obvious link is in the footer. Or you can scroll way down on the Music tab which curiously doesn't have it's own secondary tab menu.

 

[WardC]

This is ridiculous. It doesn't make the shopping experience easier, it makes it so dumbed down that you don't even ever want to buy from Apple online ever again! It's like the "Store" used to have a wealth of things you could check out all very quickly, compare, browse around, shop. You can't do that now.