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Apple Retail Stores Seeing Significant Layoffs of Recent Hires?
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Lead article references laying off significant numbers of just-hired just-trained staff. You don't hire & train a bunch of people knowing you're going to not need them by a fixed near-term date prior to them actually doing anything productive.
You have never worked retail (or if you have you either naturally have a ton of patience that you can't comprehend not everyone does or you weren't very good with it and just did what they told you and only were able to deal with the easy customers, probably just got a manager to deal with anyone else). No, not anyone can do. My roommate, who is a very valued employee of a large company that makes airplanes and helps design the planes (aerospace engineer), could not do retail and he would tell you that. For one he does not have the kind of patience to deal with the general public (and a lot of people really don't). If you want to sell stuff to people you have to have the skills to be able to read people (and trust me, that's not that easy, people don't all act the same at all) and read what they want, what they are looking for, if you are about to turn them off, when you are peaking their interest. Oh, and be able to hide when you get pissed cause the customer is being an *******. Or frustrated cause the customer is being obtuse or is just plain stupid (and in those cases you have to find some different way of explaining it to them since obviously they aren't getting what you are saying). And yeah, customers are not always reasonable. And some are plain crazy. And some are thieves. (and yes you get great customers too, don't get me wrong. Retail will teach you how sucky people can be, and also how great they can be).
Yeah, you have to at teh very least have a lot of patience (or in my case learn to have it or at least learn to hide that you don't). And that is something that is not something most people have.
Apples and oranges. Look at the larger picture and see who has the highest salaries in any corporation and you will see it's upper management and executives, not the worker bees at the bottom. I guess that the extra $1.75 per hour that the wage slaves receive really takes a lot out of the exuberant salaries of the aforementioned parties.
Highly agreed.
I think it was Henry Ford who said, "I want to pay my employees a salary that they can afford to be my customers" (more/less).
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And we all knew that new VP of Retail was bad for Apple from the beginning. I hope Cook stops the madness before it gets worse.
Names?
I hope you are right. Because everyone deserves to be correct at least once in their life. Makes you feel good.
I don't think you are familiar with very many product lines.
Nevermind what I first said in my first reply to you. I'm absolutely sure you have either never worked retail or was one of the employees I hate working with, doing your absolute minimum cause that's all you think you have to do and managing to piss off customers (without even realizing it or thinking that they are the problem and then I get to deal with the annoyed customer).
Welcome to completely baseless, unsubstantiated claims that you cannot verify. Has anyone ever worked in retail before? If this was not Apple no one would be reporting it as this kind of thing happens ... all the time.
Seriously. I'm not to happy about the guy either, but let's try to base our speculation on at least some fact.
Given your lack of business acumen and perspective I'm very glad you don't work at Apple !!!!
I went to the newly opened London Ontario store in Masonville the other day, there were about 25 apple staff, and 3 customers.
You can't really tell that through forum posts. Obviously, I'm not going to get a customer who asks me how to open iPhoto and say "Dude lol you're such a noob" or "/Applications/iPhoto.app/Contents/MacOS/iPhoto". But if someone here says something like "HSPA+ is not 4G", I'm going to say "Yes, because you define 4G, not the ITU.
"Wait, you have two accounts?
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This seems an odd story.. Why would Apple lay off people after spending money training them up? They're not in financial trouble so i don't see the UK economy affecting them much at the moment.... I'd like to read a little more about the sources of this story as this just sounds a little fishy....
just some dedication back would be nice!
they [apple college dropout employee] spend the most money god knows those apple retail employees can barely afford their mbp's and now they have to pay rent to their parents!
Jobs were lost in the UK? Are you serious? It's not like the Olympics ended yesterday and now there are no need for all the people working at the ARS.
I am an AppleCare employee. There are plenty of jobs there for the taking. You can even do at home jobs.
Retail is retail. If you are going to take it out on Apple for hiring people for a need (the Olympics) and letting them go when the need is not there then you REALLY have no idea about business and should look into ECON 101.
I am an AppleCare employee. There are plenty of jobs there for the taking. You can even do at home jobs.
Retail is retail. If you are going to take it out on Apple for hiring people for a need (the Olympics) and letting them go when the need is not there then you REALLY have no idea about business and should look into ECON 101.
I really hope this guy isn't doing the staffing according to one of those old software programs that tells you that you can have X number of work hours/shifts that day per the recent sales numbers. That's the way a grocery store chain I worked at did their staffing, and it resulted in a skeleton crew and never enough help.
There's a MINIMUM number of people/shifts that are needed in order to do certain functions, keep customers happy, and run the store, no matter what some software program says. If you can't do this and still make profits, then I argue that the store should be closed, as it will reflect badly on the brand. And Apple is one company that really does not want a bad retail experience reputation.
There's a MINIMUM number of people/shifts that are needed in order to do certain functions, keep customers happy, and run the store, no matter what some software program says. If you can't do this and still make profits, then I argue that the store should be closed, as it will reflect badly on the brand. And Apple is one company that really does not want a bad retail experience reputation.
Could be a myriad of reasons. At this point, it is all conjecture.
What is interesting is that Apple is reportedly pairing down employees on the eve of likely very big product launches (iOS 6, new iPhone, 13" MacBook Pro Retina, iPad mini, new iPods, and possibly new iPads with small dock connector).
I hope this is a change to institute more flex time for those who want/need it while giving more hours to those seeking them. Considering the positive press regarding the revamp in their store employee policies, it would be dumb to piss away all that good will that was generated.
BTW, this isn't the first time Apple Stores flushed a group of employees. There is much evidence to indicate this was done in the early years when the first batch of hires had been recruited in large part due to their knowledge of Apple products instead of retail chops. After much criticism, most were cycled out, and Apple began replacing them with recruited seasoned retail employees. I have to say that, from my own experience, I noticed a marked improvement in quality of service.
What is interesting is that Apple is reportedly pairing down employees on the eve of likely very big product launches (iOS 6, new iPhone, 13" MacBook Pro Retina, iPad mini, new iPods, and possibly new iPads with small dock connector).
I hope this is a change to institute more flex time for those who want/need it while giving more hours to those seeking them. Considering the positive press regarding the revamp in their store employee policies, it would be dumb to piss away all that good will that was generated.
BTW, this isn't the first time Apple Stores flushed a group of employees. There is much evidence to indicate this was done in the early years when the first batch of hires had been recruited in large part due to their knowledge of Apple products instead of retail chops. After much criticism, most were cycled out, and Apple began replacing them with recruited seasoned retail employees. I have to say that, from my own experience, I noticed a marked improvement in quality of service.
Yes, it was Ford who at the time paid his employees $5 per day and he ended up selling a boat load of cars. Manufacturing was changed forever! There is no way on Earth that retail employees can afford Apple's computers without saving or using their charge cards.
Don't blame Tim - Browett is part of the late turtle-necked overlord's "5 year pipeline" that has been repeated so many times some people actually think that it's true.
But is that 3 people or 300?
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Charge cards make it cost more, not less.
Re:faroz6
The guy clearly never worked retail you can tell from his typical forum posts. What you write on a forum does indicate how you are in real life. He wouldn't even be a fit working at best buy. It takes a certain type of person to work in retail. Nearly all the geniuses at apple retail are sales people. You'd (faroz6) be pretty stupid to assume they are only technical people. It takes more than knowing how to edit a file and starting an app to handle a genius position my friend.
Imagine being a business owner.
You have a retail store full of employees. You have been pressured to boost wages and salaries. Your business is dependent on heavy swings in market demand based on product release and time of year. You have made improvements to customer buying effieciency (i.e. the apple store app) which literally requires no employee to complete a purchase. This results in faster customer turnover and more employees dusting the already clean shelves. Will you retain the same number of employees just because you have already hired them?
It is a business decision. Yes, it sucks for those in need of work, but we are in a recession. Europe is crashing and burning. Sales will be influenced and overhead is not going to change by itself.
Those that are wealthy are wealthy for a reason and successful business's won't be a grandfather to the world just because they have a cash surplus because that is an inefficient way to run a business. There is a difference between being a philanthropist and correctly running a business.
I apologize if I'm coming off harsh, but as a business owner this topic hits a sweet spot for me
Edit: Even take out the recession and poor world economy - This is how the world of business works, everywhere, especially within retail.
Thank God. There is hope for the Humane Species yet.
Word.
I for one would also like to know the true reason/reasoning behind these layoffs.
Apple is a for-profit company. Maybe you should take an introductory business class.
Yeah, if you twist your head just right, the graph showing the 84% year-over-year growth of iPad sales does look kind of like a flat line.