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Office Depot and Apple

ipod mini status

coumerelli said:
I DID notice that and got kinda excited as I'm trying to find one right now...

So, I just called, and here's the answer..."We don't have them, you'll find them online tho through tech depot"

'OK' I said, "I just saw that you had all the apple stuff online and thought you might have them in the store, too.'

"NO, we're only selling through tech depot, online. Thanks"

So, not to burst anyone's bubble, but at this point (at least in Madison, WI) no goods in the brick and mortar. :mad: :(
Click to expand...

Well they are showing "Stock:0" on the ipod mini now. i guess they either sold out or lied. hehe.
 
Some info from an OD employee...

After reading some of the comments here, I felt I should straighten some things out. First, I am an Office Depot employee, specifically working in technology (computers, cameras, printers, etc.) while I'm sure there are those of us out there who have no idea what we're talking about when in comes to Apple stuff, I am not one of them, and I know several others that aren't like that either. I am a recent Apple switcher, who will sell the customer whatever fits their needs best, Apple or otherwise. Personally though, I am quite happy and excited to have this option! :)
That rant aside, I'm going to give some insight on this new development. The first Apple products we'll be carrying in store will be the iPod line (not sure if we'll have both the regular and mini, but they are coming) sometime in late July-early August. After that, nobody knows yet when we'll be getting anything else, or what we'll be getting. A lot of store most likely don't know anything about this yet, or have very limited knowledge, so I wouldn't get too discouraged if you call and don't get many answers. Give it some time, as the only official announcement yet is that we can order this stuff online, and all the "In Stock" labels you see at the website simply means we can special order that stuff in store. Note the little "S" label under the product descriptions labeled Special Order Return Policy. I hope this helps!
 
Willing to work in an Office Depot

I'm willing to work in my local Office Depot to sell Apple Computers and accessories.

The Memphis Office Depot store near the intersection of Stage Road and Germantown Parkway is all of ten minutes' drive from my house.

Part-time would be okay. Contractor would be okay.

I am a MUG member.
=-=
JJ
 
Good news over and I hope it is successful.

The most important thing that needs to be done, however, is staff training. I think that is probably why BB failed. A training DVD to provide the basic information on macs, provide answers to the basic questions that customers may ask and address FUD issues. If OD gets their staff training taken care of they are going to make some money.
 
yeah they do...

I remember going to bestbuy and asking about treo ans tmobile. They told me things like the treos were no longer being manufactured (when I knew Palm had merged) and that they no longer dealt with tmobile, because they were cheating too many customers. I called the general manager down from his breakroom/office and complained. So no, it's not just Apple. I suspect it happens with nintendo/ps2 as well.


OhEsTen said:
Whats "narrow-minded" about asking questions about the products they carry? How would $ony react if people going in to buy a ps2 were discouraged from buying their console and encouraged to buy a xbox?

Does this happen? Is it narrow-minded to be upset that people spread lies about a product they don't know anything about?
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kenaustus said:
Good news over and I hope it is successful.

The most important thing that needs to be done, however, is staff training. I think that is probably why BB failed. A training DVD to provide the basic information on macs, provide answers to the basic questions that customers may ask and address FUD issues. If OD gets their staff training taken care of they are going to make some money.
Click to expand...

That is a very good idea. I think that Apple should distribute their own sales rep training DVD if they do not do so already. Stacks of these DVDs should be sent to every store that sells Apple products with a letter to management expaining their purpose. A VHS version should also be made available for free upon request. The letter should include a toll free number to contact Apple for training and promotional materials.

Automatic software update discs for the floor models would also be a good idea since many stores don't have internet connections for floor models.


Get retail managent and sales staff on Apple's side and they will help Apple as much as they can. There is a good reason why pharmaceutical company reps are present in clinics on an almost daily basis training staff and giving away free stuff. Retail sales staff obviously aren't as highly respected as doctors and nurses but their opinions nevertheless have a significant impact on how they present various products. Many customers take their advice very seriously. Apple should treat sales reps well and give them the tools and training they need.
 
Another failure-to-be

Every major retailer that tries to be an Apple reseller fails. Because they never train the personell enough about the products and said employees are rarely people who use Macs, so they don't know why someone would want to get one over a PC.

The result is when people come in and aren't sure what to get, the salesmen steers them towards the Windows machines. When people ask them about Macs, they many times will get "I don't know" or information that is incorrect.

The machines will look great at first, but will soon fall into uselessness as people (sometimes deliberately) sabotage them and the store personell, self-admittedly clueless about Macs, don't know how to "fix" them.

I hear stories all the time about CompUSA and the little trial with Best Buy recently where having the Macs in the stores probably hurt public perception of Apple more than helping it.

If folks walk into a store and all the PC's are running and the Macs aren't, first perception is "Windows machines are more reliable" not "the people know more about PC's than Macs". This on top of "Macs cost twice as much" and the multitude more software available to PC's.

Apple would be much better repairing ties with independant dealers who's history of Apple experience is measured in years, not days.
 
itsa said:
One more strike!! My local Home Depot said they wont be carring the apple line. BOOOOO
Still internet only here!
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Why would Home Depot carry Apple products? Or was it just an error and meant to be Office instead of Home?
 
itsa said:
One more strike!! My local Home Depot said they wont be carring the apple line. BOOOOO
Still internet only here!
Click to expand...
(my emphasis - peharri)

You think that's bad, down here the Apple Store doesn't sell screwdrivers and two-by-fours!
 
Well, I just called my local Office Depot and asked if they were stocking any Apple or Mac products and he said no. I asked if they would be and he said "nope, not that I know of." So are they or aren't they or have they just not notified all the stores yet?! There is no where in Champaign, IL to get any Apple products except through the University, and I'm not a student anymore!
 
Anybody who would like to buy Apple products from their local Office Depot should probably just write them a letter with a polite request to stock Apple products in the store. Eventually they will take a hint and do so.
 
To reiterate...

It seems some haven't read my above post. Office Depot will not be receiving Apple products in store until the end of July at the earliest, and even then, it will only be the iPod line. As of right now, there is no ETA on the rest of the line. The reseller license is only days old, and it will take quite awhile for OD to get this stuff. Also, please don't be too discouraged if you call/visit a local OD and find that the staff doesn't know about this yet. The only people who would likely know about the agreement at this point are management, and attentive technology people. I will try to keep things updated as I can, but keep in mind that new info on this will be slow to come over the next few weeks, as the process is just getting started. Thanks! :)
 
Not in New England

I put in my ZIP code and NY is the closest store.

There's not much commerce in the NorthEast anyhow.

At least we have some Apple Stores.
 
macmatt99 said:
Please note not all of us who work at OD are mindless, ignorant, low-paid Mac-haters... :)
Click to expand...

How about Solaris-haters? Last I checked the Office Depot in my area had an inventory and ordering system and cash registers based on an ancient version of Solaris that seemed to cause quite a few problems.
 
SeaFox said:
Every major retailer that tries to be an Apple reseller fails. Because they never train the personell enough about the products and said employees are rarely people who use Macs, so they don't know why someone would want to get one over a PC.

The result is when people come in and aren't sure what to get, the salesmen steers them towards the Windows machines. When people ask them about Macs, they many times will get "I don't know" or information that is incorrect.

The machines will look great at first, but will soon fall into uselessness as people (sometimes deliberately) sabotage them and the store personell, self-admittedly clueless about Macs, don't know how to "fix" them.

I hear stories all the time about CompUSA and the little trial with Best Buy recently where having the Macs in the stores probably hurt public perception of Apple more than helping it.

If folks walk into a store and all the PC's are running and the Macs aren't, first perception is "Windows machines are more reliable" not "the people know more about PC's than Macs". This on top of "Macs cost twice as much" and the multitude more software available to PC's.

Apple would be much better repairing ties with independant dealers who's history of Apple experience is measured in years, not days.
Click to expand...

Apple needs shelf space if they are to grow. Their products are just not at places where people buy PCs. Because of that, the vast majority can't even consider them.

I do agree with what you say though. These resellers fail because of lack of training. Getting on the shelves and addressing the training issue is what Apple has to do. Retailers won't invest in the training as the vast majority of the employees are just passing through. Most don't make a career of selling at BB, OD or whatever retailer.
 
The REAL deal of why Best Buy Failed

I worked at Best Buy during the Imac days. Thier failure with the product can be broken down into 3 easy things.

1) Employess simply were not trained. Best Buy has a policy of requiring reps to train there employess on product specifics. All employes recieved a 2 sides piece of paper detailing how to sell. 1 Paragraph was left for technical details. The rest was about accesories, upsales, is a mac right for someone (highly inaccurate), and ALOT on service plans (it's all in one, if the monitor brakes you have to ship it to apple, ect... ect...) We saw the rep once, he didn't have the time to tell us anything. He was busy inturupting our sales and telling people our service plans were horrid and to buy Apple Care. He was tossed out and never seen again.

2) Best Buy didn't carry anything to go with the LOVLEY mac. We had some mice, maybe a joystick, and blank media. 2 shelves of DATED software we knew nothing about (1 copy of dave sat on the selves back when I was mac ignorant. I was forced to tell people a Mac couldn't talk to a PC. God I feel stupid today). That was about it. Hell we only knew the Epsons could work with the Imac, even then it was sorta sketchy. We had adapter kits or anything. We were VERY in the dark and had nothing to offer with there new product.

3) Because of 1 and 2 Managment ACTIVLEY discouraged employees from selling Imacs. Managment saw higher margins, $$$$, PSP's attachment, accesory % with PC's and thus wanted you to activley steer people into PCs. We did it because most of the staff was Younger then 21 for 1/2 the staff it was a summer job. I worked Best Buy for 2 1/2 years and was full time so I just followed blindly. Managers HATED the Imac because it hurt store numbers and thus there bonuses. We had Close out stock for almost 6 months because we were so use to NOT selling it and ripping on it.

Sadly I dont think these are wounds that will heal easily. Best Buy like Circuit is about HIGH margins, Accesories, and Service Agreements. Without those they cant make money. Thus they do not like to Sell products like Macs (Fixed Pricing and what not also makes it a pain). This is true 1st hand account BTW.

I truley hope the Office Depot stuff goes better though!
 
Great News

This really is good news. Any time commodity level stores like Best Buy or Office Depot are interested in the Mac it gives me the feeling that the Mac has reached a certain point of visiblity, credibility, and potential market share increase.

Kudos to the people who put this together.

I wonder how sucessful this will be? If nothing else, I'm sure this means you will be able to buy Mac oriented Office software and maybe even gaming software. That is pretty nice.

To those that doubt people whould buy a computer or supplies at an Office Depot as opposed to a Best Buy, etc: you clearly do not live in an urban area or an area where it would be otherwise prohibitive to travel to another store. I know a lot of people in Manhattan that would literally send out an intern to buy an MS Office suite. In fact, I'd bet they'd buy desktops from there, too. Lazy urbanites, like myself, will do things like this.
 
I don't know about you guys, but here in Oklahoma they have Apple reps that man the CompUSA stores. They are paid by apple to be there and not CompUSA, so I would assume that they will be doing the same at OfficeDepot once they get the computers in.

two notes:

1. Never trust OfficeDepots in-stock claims. I have been a long time Office Depot online user and have been lied to many times about the availability of products. Their web site is lacking in alot of areas, such as online coupons working correctly, but call the Customer Service number and they fix it immediately and apologize profusely for any wrong doing. They have the BEST customer service of any company I have EVER delt with, hands down.

2. Just think of the Mypoints you can accrue being able to buy from Officedepot.com, 3000 pts for $400+ purchases. I just hope they keep all the apple line under the officedepot section and not the techdepot, cause you don't get all the points you can get w/ the regular site. I know the Airport Express is listed under techdepot, but i'm hoping that is just until resellers get to start shipping them. Apple just started today.
 
Another Office Depot employee

I also work at Office Depot as a Technology Specialist. I only found out about this when I was looking for information on our Tech Depot website this morning, so none of the stores have even been told that we're carrying them on our website, much less about the schedule of the rollout. Let me say, though, that our store is VERY excited. I brought my ipod back with me from lunch to kind of show the employees what we were getting and then showed EACH of them how to find the Mac store on our website. The good news is there are a LOT of Macheads in the Office Depot company. When I told our Loss Prevention guy, he said he'd been suggesting for years that we carry Apple. According to appleinsider.com, Office Depot WILL be rolling out Macs to stores in a couple of months. But it is WAY too early to guess which models and when. I have heard that we were getting Ipods near the end of the month, but I figured they were going to be the rebadged HP models. Hopefully, we'll have a few minis to go with them! The funny thing is, I really wanted to leave Office Depot to go work at an Apple store because I HATE selling Windows Xp machines. Now, FINALLY, I have an option for our customers who are sick of getting viruses, popups, etc. Redmond, we have a problem! :) And, I SERIOUSLY hope they get the website fixed. I noticed all the mixups too. Embarrasing on our first day!
 
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