New Book Details Vision Pro's Troubled Launch in Apple Stores

[Brenster]

The article chimes with my own in-store experience. Had a UK launch day demo in store - staff member was well drilled with the script, had my glasses read ok and the demo was terrific. Having taken a couple of weeks to discuss a potential purpose with my wife, I went back to the store to buy (mostly for the premium ‘home cinema’ experience). Machine wouldn’t read my glasses, Apple kept no record of the lenses used in my demo so any purchase would have meant uploading my prescription to Zeiss and buying the lenses independently of the AVP itself.

Returned to the store again, this time with my second/sapre pair of glasses. Same result. Ditto with my prescription sunglasses. So no purchases. Trued another store with another machine. Same result again. If a record had been kept of the lenses my original demo/visit used OR I’d been given the identification number of the glasses used OR the Apple Store themselves could accept my prescription, they’d have had a sale.

With subsequent store visits (Manchester, Liverpool & London UK) I’ve never seen anyone demoing AVP. The dedicated, AVP branded seating are for AVP at the Manchester Trafford Centre store looks to be used as a waiting area for in-store pickups.

With no facility or allowance to deviate from the One True Script for lenses, sales can only be further restricted to either those not needing lenses or having the in-store glasses reading machines work 100% perfectly.

Given the trajectory of AVP since, I’m best waiting and hoping for a non-pro model that can both offer the same premium home cinema experience AND let me wear my prescription glasses. With Meta’s withdrawal from the VR market which could accommodate both of these and with greater sakes/market penetration, I’ve next to no hope for the future of AVP. What could have been. That original demo was spectacular.

 

[IIGS User]

This is utterly fascinating. It tracks that Cook “unwound” what sounded like a wonderful retail arm. He was the “supply chain” guy before being ceo. Was always about optimising costs. Tunnel vision for the bottom line.


Also this is just wild.

The bean counters everywhere look at the bottom line and the first thing they cut is the biggest line item expense. People. Salaries and staff. Problem is, staff make the world go 'round. Whether it's sales, training, R&D or engineering. It's the people that make an organization a success or failure.

I see it where I'm working now. The new "head honcho" so to speak is the kind of person that everywhere he went, the first thing on the chopping block is salaries and people. So that he can shuffle that money to other "priorities".

None of these things happen or work without people. Cheap salaries bring half baked efforts on the part of employees that are mostly biding their time until they can go someplace they are appreciated both in salary and conditions.

Apple clearly has a culture problem. That fish usually rots from the head (Timmy) and it's a reflection of that bean counter mentality.

Sometimes the "cost of doing business" is paying for top talent, treating them well, and making sure they know they're appreciated. Not treated like a breathing kiosk.

 

[philpalmiero]

But notice the reason why the author states the flop happened! Citing Crook’s conversion from great well compensated employees to less trained and less compensated employees. Crook gets $50m to $100m per year in stock alone. Steve never took anything but $1! This is the shift that is ruining Apple’s talent and why everyone leaves Apple for greener pastures. You don’t want to work for “the man” and have the man screw you over too. This is what has happened with Apple and I cannot wait until this money-hungry scoundrel is gone.

Nothing creative or brilliant about Crook. Standard CEO

 

[Happy_John]

Not surprised by any of this, but poor retail demos are not in the top five reasons the Vision Pro was not a runaway consumer hit. The price occupies all five of those slots.

Not price alone. You can spend more than $3,500- on a MacBook Pro or Mac Studio. And enough people do spend that much on a MacBook Pro or Mac Studio. A single Mac Studio XDR Display is also not far off this price.

The problem was not having enough compelling use cases to justify the price.

With a MacBook Pro, Mac Studio or XDR Studio Display, people know (or should know) exactly why they are buying it, and they can justify the cost against their use-case. There was never such a use-case established for the Vision Pro.

$3,500- is not an excessive amount of money for a piece of professional equipment. It is an excessive amount of money for a toy or curiosity. The Vision Pro's problem is that it (at least so far), has never gotten beyond being a toy / curiosity.

It's NOT an essential piece of kit.

 

[SalisburySam]

…even the shareholders rely on happy customers.

At least one shareholder here is also a reasonably happy customer.

 

[kingrikk]

It seems similar to the issue they also had getting apps and content for the device. They pissed off so many developers and content houses over the previous few years that no-one other than Disney, who they have corporate ties to, wanted to produce an app, and most including Google and Netflix stopped their iPad apps from being used on the device. Indies who in the past would always be relied on to produce new things for new platforms had been ignored for so long by the current Apple leadership that they couldn't be bothered either. And so you ended up with a device that no-one loved.

 

[turbineseaplane]

The average person is shockingly daft when it comes to tech, even with something like an iPhone so imagine a visionpro. Phones mostly sell themselves at this point but other tech can really benefit from knowledgeable retail staff.

Average people simply don't want to strap on VR headsets.

That's a HUGE part of the problem with all HMDs.

 

[dagamer34]

The problem isn’t the price point, that’s a red herring. There are plenty of people with truly high levels of disposable income who have bought and still feel “meh” about it.

Price is like #3.

#1 is “what do you do in this thing? What problem does it solve?”. No amount of money you spend can bring the developer interest that is clearly not there. Nor bring unique content you might be interested in.

#2 is weight. It’s so heavy that no amount of money can make it lighter. So you are limited in how much time you comfortably spend in it.

#1 and #2 above beat out price because even if you gave them out for free, or $100, a similar thing is gonna happen. People are gonna get bored and it’ll collect dust.

A great product whose only problem is price can so easily be fixed. 2nd hand market means you can get it for way cheaper, those units will be snapped up, and will then keep that price actually quite high relative to MSRP. I think Vision Pro was half-off within a year?

Truly a miss. Form factor just ain’t it.

 

[Lounge vibes 05]

“Cook installed Angela Ahrendts, whose sensibility was closer to the Jobs era”…
What? Who ever thought this?
It’s comments like this that make me not believe this article.
It is absolute revisionist history to say that Angela Ahrendts was “Jobs like”.
If anything, there has been a dramatic improvement in Apple stores since she left.
And if we might recall for a minute, almost all of the moves she made were heavily criticized by those who were around when Jobs was.
Remember? She completely deprioritized the genius bar and customer support in favor of making the Apple Store into a “town square”?
Oh, you don’t remember that?

 

[WarmWinterHat]

Average people simply don't want to strap on VR headsets.

That's a HUGE part of the problem with all HMDs.

Yep, I wouldn't want to a 5 year old at my birthday party and see this guy walking around, blankly starting at me and my friends:

 

[turbineseaplane]

It's sort of interesting to contrast the Neo to the VisionFlop.

The Neo is affordable and offers exceptionally clear value and usefulness to the buyer.

It's the opposite of the VisionFlop, and as a result is flying off shelves everywhere.

 

[luvmymbp]

Scheiber traces the deterioration to the transition from Steve Jobs to Tim Cook. Jobs built Apple retail around a permanently employed, generously compensated workforce, on the theory that any worker who felt second-class would make customers feel the same way. Under Cook, that model was progressively unwound: contractor numbers grew, training shifted from multi-week instructor-led programs to brief self-guided modules, and leadership rotated toward cost control. After an unsuccessful attempt to slash staffing under John Browett, Cook installed Angela Ahrendts, whose sensibility was closer to the Jobs era, but her 2019 departure brought in Deirdre O'Brien, who pushed stores toward conventional retail metrics: device activations, accessory attachment rates, and AppleCare+ sign-ups. The "creative" role tracked a similar trajectory, shrinking from unlimited one-on-one customer tutorials to group sessions to what some employees described as barely disguised product marketing.

Imho, this change in the retail culture is more important than the failure of any product. Bought my first MBP in 2010 after using PCs since the 90s. Back then, at the Apple Store, you were treated like a valued customer, the employees couldn't do enough to help you with the products and make you feel comfortable. The vibe was laid back and friendly...totally different atmosphere today.

 

[turbineseaplane]

At least one shareholder here is also a reasonably happy customer.

I miss the days of "make great products and the profits will follow" (paraphrasing).

Tim is moving the company further and further away from that ethos.

It will be a problem eventually.

 

[MacPainter]

FWIW this runs contrary to my personal experience. I went to day 1 demos of both the Apple Watch and AVP. The Apple Watch demo was laced with inaccuracies and frustration by the employee. I actually had to correct/train them on how to use the watch based simply on the videos Apple had previously released. Contrast this to my AVP demo which was filled with enthusiasm and patient, accurate guidance.

I’ve been an Apple Watch users since day 1, but I bought and returned my AVP because the product was lacking, not because it was poorly demoed.

 

[bigandtasty]

The Apple Vision Pro is still 100x better than any Meta Quest.

and costs a ridiculous amount more

 

[turbineseaplane]

I bought and returned my AVP because the product was lacking, not because it was poorly demoed.

Fair ... but we shouldn't lose sight of the fact you returned it as the product was lacking.

No amount of selling it better or doing better demos can help a bad product become a good one.

 

[Lounge vibes 05]

“Apple sold fewer than 500,000 Vision Pro units in 2024, compared to roughly 10 million Apple Watches in their first year on sale and more than 200 million iPhones annually.”

Article fails to mention that Apple also could literally only *produce* 500,000 Vision Pro units, so comparing it to the $350 Apple Watch or a $700 iPhone is irrelevant.

I think it’s safe to say that two years later, the Vision Pro has not moved the augmented reality and virtual reality market the way Apple may have hoped it would, but trying to blame it on the retail staff and teams and compare it to the launches of the Apple Watch and iPhone is not the move.
The Vision Pro didn’t fail because Tim Cook fired Angela Ahrendts, come on now.
I actually demoed the Vision Pro at an Apple Store and had a fantastic experience, and everyone who I know who demoed the Vision Pro at an Apple Store had a fantastic experience.
none of us bought one though, and it wasn’t because of the store, the staff, the demo experience, or anything like that. It was because of, you know, all of the obvious reasons. The price, the lack of content, the fact that it’s a headset, not exactly the most convenient of form factors.

 

[maflynn]

I feel it was imediately obvious that this Vision Pro would be a flop, which kind of shows Apple are out of touch or believe their own hype machine

yet apple's most ardent fans, claim commercial success was never the intent, that this was a halo device, or that it was meant to show what you could do, etc.

 

[turbineseaplane]

yet apple's most ardent fans, claim commercial success was never the intent, that this was a halo device, or that it was meant to show what you could do, etc.

Retconning 101

Tim absolutely thought he was launching his "iPhone moment".

You don't do this Vanity Fair piece and photoshoot if not.

 

[kalsta]

At least one shareholder here is also a reasonably happy customer.

Glad to hear it. I’m still… mostly happy. I mean, most of the hardware is great. But there are certainly things I’m not so happy about:

• Apple has somewhat lost the plot when it comes to UI/UX. The Apple Human Interface Guidelines of old were legendary. Now they promote Liquid Glass. 'Nuff said.
• Ads in Apple Maps? What’s next? One of my key arguments when promoting Apple products has long been that the company was genuine about user privacy because their profits come from hardware, not advertising. Can’t really argue that anymore can I?
• A CEO who donates money to… (Okay, I’d better stop there since this is not a political thread.)
• Subscriptions, subscriptions, subscriptions. The Creator Studio is making me worried that this is the future path for all Apple software. I mean, I ditched Adobe after decades of using their software because of this.

 

[macfacts]

negative sales, lol

 

[maflynn]

• Apple has somewhat lost the plot when it comes to UI/UX. The Apple Human Interface Guidelines of old were legendary. Now they promote Liquid Glass. 'Nuff said.
• Ads in Apple Maps? What’s next? One of my key arguments when promoting Apple products has long been that the company was genuine about user privacy because their profits come from hardware, not advertising. Can’t really argue that anymore can I?
• A CEO who donates money to… (Okay, I’d better stop there since this is not a political thread.)
• Subscriptions, subscriptions, subscriptions. The Creator Studio is making me worried that this is the future path for all Apple software. I mean, I ditched Adobe after decades of using their software because of this.

I don't care about how Tim Apple spends his own money, so I'll largely not respond to that aspect.

As for the others you pointed out, your spot on, Tim Cook and by extension, Apple is more concerned about investor value then customer experience. Where as Steve Jobs had the polar opposite philosophy.

If you make insanely great products that the consumers love, then the investor value will follow

 

[Lounge vibes 05]

Steve never took anything but $1!

Insanely, insanely misleading.
Steve owned tons of Apple stock, even got into some legal trouble for his stock practices, and had a net worth of $10.2 billion at the time of his death, almost entirely generated during his time as Apple CEO.
Not trying to get political here, so please don’t take what I’m about to say as a political statement on my opinion, because it’s not, it’s just the objective truth. Saying Steve only made one dollar a year as CEO is just as misleading as saying our current president makes zero dollars as president because he gives his presidential stipend away. It’s obviously not true..

 

[WarmWinterHat]

Insanely, insanely misleading.
Steve owned tons of Apple stock, even got into some legal trouble for his stock practices, and had a net worth of $10.2 billion at the time of his death, almost entirely generated during his time as Apple CEO.
Not trying to get political here, so please don’t take what I’m about to say as a political statement on my opinion, because it’s not, it’s just the objective truth. Saying Steve only made one dollar a year as CEO is just as misleading as saying our current president makes zero dollars as president because he gives his presidential stipend away. It’s obviously not true..

Yep, the $1 thing isn't uncommon in large corps; it's just a tax thing. They have company cars, company jets, company credit card for meals and stock out the wazoo. They don't need a salary.

 

[Happy_John]

Insanely, insanely misleading.
Steve owned tons of Apple stock, even got into some legal trouble for his stock practices, and had a net worth of $10.2 billion at the time of his death, almost entirely generated during his time as Apple CEO.
Not trying to get political here, so please don’t take what I’m about to say as a political statement on my opinion, because it’s not, it’s just the objective truth. Saying Steve only made one dollar a year as CEO is just as misleading as saying our current president makes zero dollars as president because he gives his presidential stipend away. It’s obviously not true..

Yep. Income is not the same as salary.