Lure of Apple Stores

Holiday traffic at Apple's retail stores may reflect an increased flow of PC users migrating to Macs, say analysts with the firm Piper Jaffray. Monitoring six hours' worth of visitors to Apple Stores in the American east and midwest, the firm discovered this weekend that an abnormal 27 percent of those who passed within 25 feet of a store would walk in. On Friday afternoon, some 462 people were entering Apple Stores per hour, while by Saturday evening this rate had fallen to 241. This is likely evidence of more shopper interest, says Piper, which could lead to greater sales for Apple in 2008 and 2009.

The group notes, however, that the weekend's purchasing rate was far below the number of visitors. Approximately 5.3 Macs were sold per hour, an increase from 4.3 Macs in August; at the same time though, iPhone sales dropped slightly from 1.3 units to 1.

iPod sales dominated numerically, at a rate of 13 players an hour. The vast majority of these were Nanos, at 46 percent; Classics and Shuffles accounted for 19 percent each, while Touches amounted to 16 percent. Piper notes that Shuffles had been expected to account for a full 38 percent, marking a drastic shift towards Apple's more costly products, with the exception of the top-end Touch.

by MacNN Staff