The opening of the first Apple Store in the US at the weekend turned a suburban Washington D.C. mall into a scene from a rock concert.
More than 500 zealous Mac fans lined up as early as 4 am for the chance to be the store's first customer and to support Apple Computer's retail experiment. The crowd - which earlier broke into chants of "Apple! Apple! Apple!" - roared when the stored open at 10am.
The spectacle drew curious gazes from early-hours shoppers and mall workers, who occasionally stopped to puzzle over the crowd building outside the store. The first Apple Store is located at Washington's largest mall. The second of 25 stores planned for this year opened later Saturday outside Los Angeles.
Chris Barylick was the first customer in line, having arrived six hours before the doors opened.
"I went to this rave last night and had all this extra energy, so I decided to come here," he said. But two hours after arriving, security guards asked the freelance writer to leave. "I went from 7-11 to 7-11 before getting back here" a couple hours before the opening, he added. He later bought a copy of Mac OS X.
Another added: "There's finally going to be place where we (Mac users) can go to shop and not be directed to a PC."
Security guards kept close track of people entering the store, as local regulations limited capacity to 80 people. An hour after the store opened, the line outside only grew longer, even after early shoppers walked out with their purchases and new buyers made their way inside.
Extending the Mac community
Apple CEO Steve Jobs described the stores as a way of expanding Apple's brand and doubling the company's market share. "Five down, 95 to go," said Jobs of Apple's market share vs. -Wintel" companies.
Apple hopes to build on its fiercely loyal base of Mac users, who have a reputation for pitching in at computer stores to help sell Macs. Apple is employing long-time Mac users in the stores. By including a question-and-answer area in the back of the store, the Genius Bar, and hiring teachers, Apple hopes to extend the Mac community to new users, Jobs said.
To make this point, store customers found this message in their shopping bags: "This store is our way of personally introducing you to the Apple way of life. At Apple, we are committed to building a community where knowledge can be shared freely."
This approach made a lot of sense to Drejer.
"There's no such thing as individual user," he said. "There's just the Mac community."
