Retail Watchers

https://komonews.com/news/local/microso ... cal-stores

Another of Microsoft's attempts to clone something that a competitor does a much better job of (in this case, Apple stores) that ultimately fails. They seem to do that a lot.

Maybe I lead a sheltered life or something but I didn't even know they HAD stores in the first place! On the other hand, that's probably the problem-no promotion and/or marketing support. If you want people to shop at your store they first have to know your store exists.

Those stores were not very profitable. People who have no clue about using Windows computers would go there and the employees seemed to be very annoyed at having to give out free advice about how to troubleshoot computers. Those visitors rarely ever bought anything.

Apple has sort of a cult following where people would line up and buy the latest and most expensive products. Microsoft does not have this cult following and their stores are mostly empty of customers. The employees also did not even seem enthusiastic about getting people to buy anything from the store. The money from sales would first go to the computer maker and then a small amount would go to Microsoft.

The Microsoft Store was just advertising the Microsoft name to people who would pass by, but it did very little to make people buy anything from the store. Microsoft Windows is already on most personal computers around the world. From what people say about Windows, most people are annoyed that it is on most computers and there is little choice as to an alternative operating system. What else are these stores supposed to do? Are they supposed to try to convert rabid Apple fans into Windows users? Good luck with that.

Most of the business I saw at Microsoft stores was not around the PCs but initially selling Windows Phones and later X-Box 360s. Also they pushed the Surface line of computers. The huge focus on video games was never going to be enough to keep them around. I've expected the closure since Balmer left.

These stores would have never worked in the long run. Windows and iOS users are on completely on opposite sides of the tech spectrum.

iOS users want style, ease of use and performance. Apple designs their hardware to specifically run iOS software which means little to no issues.

Windows on the other hand is made to run on multiple manufactures products and performance, ease of use and compatibility is much different. Who wants to constantly have to update Windows to "fix" bugs and security issues? Most of these updates cause performance issues then ANOTHER update needs to be released to fix the previous update issues...it's just not worth the hassle.

Microsoft thinks they can sell their products at Apple prices which most consumers scoff at.