Yup - Perk decided to purchase a new copy of Windows 7 at the new, flagship Windows store (the only one in the world ATM). I went in without letting them know anything about my proclivities or anything - I just went to have them counsel me on which product to purchase and get a feel for the experience.
First blush:Well, the reviews are right: the blatant scoff of the Apple store look and feel is spot on. Rather than a silver apple as the only sign in the front, it's the 4 color Window logo. Lots of young people in colorful shirts, willing to help. Even down to the candy-plastic name tags and pens hanging around their neck - it was ridiculous. Blonde wood shelves and tables with lots and lots and lots of shelves with Windows 7 on them. In fact, the vast majority of the store was that: racks with Windows 7 on them. Some odd computers here and there, but not a lot.
Quick count: 25 employees walking the floor to 18 customers. Bear in mind, this is a one of a kind store - the first in the world, and it's been open a week. I walked to the store across the way and the SunglassHut kiosk in the middle of the aisle and asked them about traffic - busy busy busy on day one, since then, hardly anyone. In fact, it looked a little extra busy when I was there (I came just after the dinner rush, when there's most people freely walking in the mall).
I also stood at the entrance for a while just to get a sense for why people came in and what people thought while walking by. Interestingly, there was almost total apathy as people walked by - adults, kids, you name it - no interest at all. I listened to 10 people walk in over the course of about 20 minutes. To a man, the question was, "Windows 7?" Many of these people left the store without a purchase.
My experience with the salespeople:There were two young ladies in the front of the store (there's a Windows 7 shelf in your way, right as you walk in with all the different versions, lush all over it - you can see it surrounded by the girl in green and the girl in orange in the top shot). I told them that I'd like to purchase Windows 7 - which one should I get?
They started with very pedantic "Well, if you're just using at home, then home basic might be good for you, but if you do a little more than other people then home premium might be good. If you do some business stuff then you should probably go Business premium but the best one is Ultimate. Here I had to let a little more of me get out: I told them that I'd been a programmer a long time and needed just a little more detail. What, exactly, did Business offer that home didn't? Why home premium rather than basic? They couldn't really answer me so they gave me a brochure. I was confused, so I said that I wanted my clients to be able to connect to a Windows Domain. They immediately jumped then that I required Business Premium at a minimum. Ultimate really only gives me some Bit-thing which I didn't understand and 35 languages that I can work in. English is fine, thank you.
Next, the upgrade question. Here's where it got interesting. An upgrade for BP is 200, where a clean install is 300. You can upgrade from Vista to 7, but XP to 7 will be a little more trouble - you've got to essentially backup everything, let Win7 destroy everything, then restore what you can.
By now, a totally John Goodman "PC" looking man came over to help. I mentioned that I was concerned about Win7 dumping everything and the upgrade process from XP - he said, with a straight face:
"Oh don't worry. I've had to do it several times to my machine. It should work for you just fine."
I tried not to make my blinking disbelief too obvious. Did he really just say that? By now two more people had walked over and I was feeling a little overwhelmed. They began a discussion, right there in front of me, about the perils, pitfalls and potential issues of an XP upgrade. They even disagreed about which version I should have, and why. I told them I needed to step back and just think about how many of what versions I needed. They stood there and continued to debate while I retired to a corner.
There I watched 2 young Sri Lankan men (I believe) play with the only thing that seemed to really have wow in the store, the MS table top. Here you can see me taking a picture of them, taking a picture of themselves playing with it ... on an iPhone. This is also where I managed to hang for a while and just get the lay of the land and an idea for the people walking in and out.
The kiosk with the Windows 7 I had been looking at was again clear of people save the original young lady I had met. I told her what I was looking for - a few licenses for Business. Well, they don't have multi-license packs for business. But I could purchase Home Premium, and then these little ancillary packages that would upgrade HP to BP for only $150 each, so my net expenditure would be about $150 less than if I purchase just BP licenses. OK, I'll do it. Oh, but wait - there's no clean install version of that, only upgrade. Honestly, the number of options, configurations, ways I could purchase etc etc was just monumentally confusing. I consider myself a reasonable thinker: but after a few moments with them I was literally unable to wrap my mind around what exactly (and how many of each) I needed to purchase.
By now my head hurt and I just wanted to leave. The store had demonstrated itself to be exactly the same experience as Windows itself is. Confused, confusing and unfocused. I grabbed a BP clean install and said I'll just take this.
She took to me to a kiosk to pay, it didn't work. She took me to another one, it was logged out and she didn't have a password. She took me to the back of the store where there was another and finally managed to charge me. Behind here was the "Guru bar" where 3 people with different computers were surrounded by 3 each (total 9) people working over their computers, pointing at the screen and working with them on their systems. It's separated by glass so I could not hear what was going on, but from the looks of the customers (blank, faintly creeped out) it seemed clear that the "Gurus" were not hitting home.
About that MSFT stock:Of course, this little retail store is a pimple on the ass of a bacteria on the butt of a fly to M$ - it really shouldn't hurt that badly - but there are some fundamental problems that, if they don't get sorted out, will be. First: they have a *huge* amount of floor space in a very expensive mall. They have very, very few products to actually sell and, from my little experience but from common sense as well, people are not going to trek to the mall to visit a store that has a pretty limited array of computers so that they can purchase Toshiba directly from Microsoft. This means that the store is a Windows 7 store and a customer service bar. The amount of Windows 7 they'll need to sell out of that store to make it worth anything is beyond profound - it's ridiculous.
IMO they should have gone for a "Microsoft Solutions" store rather than the Windows store. Then they could've had phones, the XBox ... lots of sexy stuff, rather than just a single piece of software with a really confusing purchase matrix.
The real problem, IMO, is that they've both validated the Apple store model (by copying it directly), spent themselves into a corner...
(here is the bag that I received my Windows 7 in: typical M$ fashion - take the Apple bag, spend way more on it to try and look better - but it offers no benefit at all. Note the very high quality - canvas, stitched, it even feels printed/raised not silked. Clearly, "Better" than an Apple bag. But I need this hunk of anti-Green to walk out with a box of software? I'm actually amazed that they'd spend money here. As a stock holder, I would be aghast.)
...and when the store finally fails, they will have huge egg on their face and perhaps even a fatal public opinion blow. They have devalued the Windows brand by trying to be Apple. My lasting impression was, "Don't you guys have any original ideas of your own?" In fact my store experience was like a living Get A Mac commercial - John Goodman trying desperately to be as hip as Mac - which he neither can be or, frankly, should be. Windows has a personality, it has a following and it has ubiquity on it's side - they should be focusing on leverage THAT, rather than trying to be Apple. The net experience was that they just look pathetic.
Perk predicts 18 months that they will play with this notion and then step back big - unless it's even quicker. This is a horrible, ill conceived model that is going to do Windows no good at all. It may or may not have any impact on the stock value, but it will certainly have an impact in the long run on people's impression of windows. Or maybe not. Maybe the lack of customers, or excitement at the store is right in line: exactly where the bulk of the existing Windows customer base is already. Perhaps people already could give a shit, and this whole quixotic retail store notion is just emblematic of M$'s real troubles with Windows.
