Ron Johnson quit in late 2011, which was shortly after Tim Cook became CEO. Johnson was competent (unlike Cook) at his role in Apple, which was why Steve Jobs put him in that role.
One of Cook’s numerous incompetent decisions was in hiring Angela Ahrendts in 2014 to fill the position that Johnson left in 2011. Arhendts made Burberry a lot of money when she was CEO of it. Since Cook is an elitist who wanted to snobbishly make Apple look like a high fashion brand, and since Cook cares more about money than product functionality and taste, Cook hired Arhendts.
Arhendts dropped the name “Store” from the original name “Apple Store” in order to try to pretentiously sound like an elitist high fashion brand. Cook loves that kind of pretentious superficially. Arhendts and Cook were oblivious to the fact that in the many cities with Apple offices, dropping the word “Store” from the store name would be confusing to people trying to look up addresses and differentiating between which is an office and which is a store.
Not only that, when Johnson left Cook first picked
John freaking Browett, a guy taken straight from the bargain bin of executives, who predictably turned out to be so bad, even Cook realised he had to do something, STAT. In that sense, at the time Angela Ahrendts really seemed like an upgrade, because she effectively was – over Browett, that is lol –, and at least she understood the assignment, by cementing Apple as a premium brand and taking their store – and, I suspect, wearables – design in a tasteful and not really un-Apple-like direction. Maybe she was partly responsible for egging Cook et al. on when it came to developing and releasing those solid gold “Series 0” Apple Watches, but at least she didn’t cause an outright mutiny along the retail ranks like Browett did (and would, in due time, cause among customers themselves, too). In that sense, Browett was the “New Coke” that allowed Cook to apparently, but not quite, go back to the original recipe and fool everyone into thinking things went back to business as usual.
Here’s the thing: we all do mistakes, and knowing how to course correct is a great skill to have, that much has to be said and recognised in Cook; but how could the talent head hunters at Apple
and Cook fail so spectacularly, when it was clear to any bystander with half a brain and who ever stepped foot into that kind of store – yes, every country has them; in mine they’re Worten, Rádio Popular and MediaMarkt/Darty, and not only do they all suck in very similar ways, they were
the very reason Jobs had to come up with Apple Stores in the first place 🤦♂️ – that a former Dixons executive, of all people, would
never be a good fit, no matter how good he was at turning a profit and making his generic electronics and appliances store chain suck just a little bit less? It makes you wonder, doesn’t it? That guy would’ve never made it past an interview with Jobs 3.0 (continuing with the soda analogies, not only did Sculley make it, he was also actively courted and took convincing to accept the top role, but that was a different Jobs at a different Apple), if he even made it that far in said Jobs-led Apple.
