Retail’s Most Profitable Square Footage: Apple

Market News Updates:

According to research provided by CoStar, sales per square foot at all but a few public retailers have declined to an average of around $325 in recent years, down from nearly $375 in the early 2000s. There’s little doubt that the online giant Amazon.com, Inc. has been disrupting traditional retailers, however, several companies have managed to grow sales despite the declining trend in brick-and-mortar.[…]

With sales per square foot viewed as a major component of retail success, according to industry data provided by eMarkter, the #1 retailer in sales per square foot is Apple Inc., which did a staggering $5,546 per square foot. […]

Leading the jewelry retail industry with sales of $2,951 per square foot, Tiffany & Co., through its subsidiaries, designs, manufactures and retails jewelry and other items worldwide.

Again I say: Apple’s retail stores are a vastly underestimated strength of the company. None of Apple’s competitors have anything like it.

Also seems like a good time to re-link to my 2012 piece on Apple stores, “A Big Misunderstanding”:

What Apple understands and its critics did not (and still do not) is that many people, from all walks of life, simply appreciate nice things. They accuse Apple of pretension and elitism, but it’s they, the critics, who hold that the mass market for phones and tablets is overwhelmingly composed of tasteless, fickle shoppers who neither discern nor care about product quality. […]

Apple is not selling caviar against cheese and crackers. They’re selling better-tasting cheese and crackers, and all you have to do is come into their store and taste some to believe for yourself. Anyone who believes Apple is about to have the rug pulled out from under the iPhone and iPad by commoditized Android devices should spend a few minutes inside an Apple retail store this holiday week.

2012 was the peak of Android/Samsung mania. A lot of people really did think Apple was about to have its lunch eaten in the phone and tablet markets.

★ Friday, 28 July 2017