Apple Recloses 11 Stores in Southern California, Maryland, Ohio, and Tennessee

[BaracksPhallusPalace]

Not sure who will read this but let me just urge you to take this seriously. Even if you are young and survive the virus there is a good chance you will end with permanent lung damage or months of cognitive fuzziness.

Wear a mask if you must go out. Stay home if you can.

The masks do nothing, the nationwide requirement is a psyop. I only wear them out of respect for businesses that require you to have one on to enter... that aside, I think they are absolutely useless. Consider the fact that most people aren’t even wearing masks, they‘re wrapping a cloth around their face. The virus passes through that like a fart through underwear.

The other thing to take into consideration, is that the actual medical grade masks, and masks with filters that some people wear are not meant to be worn every day, and can cause other respiratory issues along with restricting oxygen intake which can cause brain damage on its own. There comes a point when people need to not live in fear and get on with their lives... we’ve been dealing with this lockdown for going on 6 months now and the toll its taking on mental health and people’s livelihoods is far worse than the possibility of getting the virus. We don’t all shelter in place during Flu season every year... and the death counts from the seasonal flu are still higher than the total for Covid19.

 

[Apple_Robert]

I can understand Apple’s caution, even though they were already doing temperature checks and requiring a mask at open stores.

The good news is we can still place orders, even though shipping has been greatly delayed, depending on device and configuration.

 

[FreeState]

...Just keep the stores open, limit who can come in, and make them wear a mask. Shutting down the stores does nobody any good.

You realize this is what Apple is doing? The stores that are open do just that - limited occupancy, mask and robusk hygiene standards. The ones they are closing are in areas that have flared up to the point where their liability it too great to remain open.

 

[naturalstar]

Appreciate that Apple has the foresight to understand that if one of their employees gets sick and dies due to COVID exposure while on the job, they will be sued by the surviving family.

While the NBA, colleges, and public businesses were shutting down, our company still expected us to travel to the client site the following week. I specifically asked my director what happens if someone catches COVID and dies while traveling and working in client locations. This is a liability and it only takes one death for this to blow up. Mind you, it was heavy in my mind because I had been weirdly sick for 3 weeks in February, but I didn't qualify for testing based on what was known at the time. My director got quiet for a long time and finally said, we're going to have a conversation with the client to see what they want to do. Even after all of that, it took the client to tell us at the end of the week to not return onsite until further notice.

I get the economic impact of shuttering businesses, but employers can't be reckless with people's lives for the sake of the dollar and not expect some consequences. I would be surprised if there aren't cases out already. Apple looked at their stores in those states with climbing cases/deaths and asked the basic question: Does the reward outweigh the risk? The answer was clearly, it does not.

The only inconveniences in closing store are for:
1) Those who want to return items that were purchased in-store prior to store closures - and the majority in this category should have been taken care of when the stores first re-opened since they only had first 14 days to do this. There are states - like mine - where the Apple store never re-opened, so there are people who get to enjoy their purchases for an extended period of time. I suspect that Apple will come up with a new policy around this shortly since they had no idea that closures would last this long.

2) Those who want to get repairs done. Apple can easily remedy this by sending a pre-paid box to customers and allowing for customers to send their machine overnight or by whatever method to their repair center.

Customers don't need to go into the Apple store to buy Apple products. They can buy online at the Apple store or at any of the Apple retailers that have always carried Apple product. Yes, you may not be able to get the product immediately as driving 10 minutes to the nearest store (which is me), but again, from Apple's POV, you're still able purchase products.

 

[MadeTheSwitch]

It really is a no-win scenario for everyone. Whatever decisions are made will greatly impact people in one form or another.

Then I guess all things being equal, erroring on the side of life is the best course of action.

Imo Apple should reconfigure the stores to just have a simple pick up counter for store pick-ups/Apple care drop offs, without actually opening up the whole store.

Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. Pickups for phones shouldn’t be much different than pickups for food. Probably even safer. And certainly no different than a Best Buy curbside pickup.

The masks do nothing

That’s just your opinion. To say that though, is to tell doctors the world over that they have been doing things wrong for a century, and that the general population of people in Asian countries have been doing things wrong for many years. And I just don’t think that’s the case. People understood to wear mask even 100 years ago during the 1918 pandemic. So I don’t even know why this is a question at this point.

The other thing to take into consideration, is that the actual medical grade masks, and masks with filters that some people wear are not meant to be worn every day, and can cause other respiratory issues along with restricting oxygen intake which can cause brain damage on its own

Doctors and nurses wear them for 12 hour shifts multiple days a week under the most stressful of conditions and somehow are getting through it.

There comes a point when people need to not live in fear and get on with their lives.

It sounds like you haven’t lost anyone to this yet. I have. It changes your perspective quite a bit

 

[chucker23n1]

I dont understand your point.

More of an observation than a point.

I saw the article, thought, "hey, wasn't there a similar article a few days back?" and, yup: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...reclose-following-return-of-lockdown.2244868/

Looking at some of the "dissenting" top comments, I wonder if they're too focused on death rates and not enough on overall damage.

 

[icanhazsabres]

Why not think out of the box? Allow have 2 to 4 employees with customers (who have been screened) at a time while keep them social distanced and with proper ppe? At least they would be partially open and it would be responsible. If the area is too bad, then close them.

That’s exactly what they do. In the case of those stores, the region had an increase in Covid19 cases and they closed again. Check any Apple Store location’s website to see the measures they put in place. My local store had visits by appointment only, mandatory masks, and line markers out front to enforce distancing. Temperature checks if you were going inside and curbside pickup for some online purchases to avoid people entering at all.