Down But Not Out

Here's to Small Apple Dealers Who Make a Difference

Dirk Pilat - 2002.12.05

This article finds me writing in one of Germany's high speed trains hurtling towards Berlin at the amazing speed of three hundred kilometers per hour. I completely forgot how nice train journeys can be: You don't have to check in hours before you leave, you can buy your ticket on the train, and there is no need for a transfer bus from an airport towards the city-centre (as all of Germanys train stations are bang in the middle of the urban conglomerate).

But sorry, I digress as usual. The real reason for this column is the infrastructure that Apple has build up in Germany. Although still lacking any Apple Shops as glamorous and attractive as the new stores in the US (you guys have it good), this country has an surprising dense and good supply of Mac retailers and service centres. Apart from one giant chain, most of the shops are being run by small companies, offering retail, consulting, and service in one.

The large majority is being run by enthusiastic individuals who sold their soul to Apple way back in the eighties and do what they enjoy most: Spend all their time advising and consulting their clients on how to fully enjoy their computers. And although they would probably be able to increase their clientele and improve their balance sheet, most of them refuse to store Wintel/AMD compatible stuff. At all. Okay, maybe apart from Virtual PC and USB hardware.

A little example: My mother's 9600 recently suffered a fatal hard drive problem that I was not able to diagnose or repair appropriately from 18,600 km away, so I contacted her nearest Apple store and prepared them for her arrival, making sure they would report any problems back to me - and reassuring my not very hardware literate mom.

After recovering all of her old data, exchanging the struck hard drive, and updating all of her software (!), they charged her 100 Euro (100 US$). The machine has worked flawlessly since then, and that little shop has now become the source for all her hardware and software needs, as the 9600 will get a radical overhaul with a big new hard drive, a G4 card, and OS X 10.2.2 (after seeing the eye candy on my machine).

So what's my point? My point is that, contrary to popular belief, a properly run small shop full of enthusiastic Apple evangelists can have the same impact on a community as a full blown, hyper-chic branded store.

So on this gloomy December evening, here's to all the small Apple retailers who improve their clients lives with sensible advice and a sales force not consisting of spotty nerds.

Cheers.

Join us on Facebook!

Links for the Day

Mac of the Day: Macintosh Portable, introduced 1989.09.20. The nearly 16 lb. behemoth was innovative but not a smashing success.
Support Low End Mac

Recent Deals

About LEM Support Usage Privacy Contact

Down But Not Out begun April 26, 2002. All Down But Not Out articles ©2002-03, 2006 by Dirk Pilat. Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2012 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc. unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iPad iPhone, iMac, iPod, MacBook, MagSafe, Mac Pro, Apple TV, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.
Advice is presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Please report errors to .
LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
Email may be published at our discretion unless marked "not for publication"; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it. For more details, see our Terms of Use.

Custom Search

Follow Low End Mac on Twitter
Join Low End Mac on Facebook

Low End Mac Reader Specials

TypeStyler 11 is now in the Mac App Store!! -- Special Introductory Price of $59.95!! -- To Buy From The Mac App Store Click Here Now!! Or buy direct from Strider Software.

Don't install Parallels to play poker online! Poker Mac will show you how to download and install a native Mac poker and Mac Casino applications in minutes.

Affiliates

Amazon.com
The Apple Store
The iTunes Store
PC Connection Express
GainSaver
Parallels Desktop for Mac
eBay