TMCnet News
Apple Store to open in Stamford(Stamford Advocate, The (Stamford, CT) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Jun. 28--There's no better time than this Fourth of July holiday weekend to download "The Star Spangled Banner" or John Philip Sousa's "The Stars & Stripes Forever" to your iPod. And if you don't have an iPod, this is the weekend that Apple Computer Inc. will open its doors at the Stamford Town Center mall to sell you one. The 4,100-square-foot Apple Store is scheduled to open at 10 a.m. Saturday on Level 4 of the mall, near Macy's. The Advocate reported Feb. 28 that Cupertino Calif.-based Apple was advertising to staff a new store at the Stamford Town Center, but neither the maker of Macintosh computers nor mall management would confirm those plans. Michael McAndrews, general manager of the 130-store Town Center, said Apple prefers not to announce locations of new retail stores until an opening is imminent. "It's a great addition," he said of the Apple Store. "It is a destination store, and it's a very unique product." McAndrews said an Apple Store manager told him 300 to 500 people might be lined up for Saturday's grand opening. According to the Raleigh Chronicle, more than 300 people waited for the doors to open last weekend at Apple's new North Carolina store. Apple's Web site said the first 1,000 people to visit the Stamford mall store will receive a free Apple T-shirt. In addition, the Apple site said it will host a grand opening sweepstakes next month at the Stamford Apple store, which will launch instructional workshops pertaining to its products during the first week of next month. The sweepstakes giveaway, valued at $2,229, includes an iMac computer, iPod nano music player, a printer, a digital camera and a camcorder. This week, publicly traded Apple also is scheduled to open a store in Knoxville, Tenn. Company spokeswoman Kristin Huguet said Apple operates 153 retail computer stores worldwide, not including those set to open this weekend. Apple stores in Connecticut are in the Westfarms Mall in Farmington and the Danbury Fair Mall in Danbury. Another Apple store is in The Westchester mall in White Plains, N.Y., while a store at 57th Street and 5th Avenue in New York opened last month. Stamford's Apple Store is "good for the mall and a billboard for the Apple brand," said Craig Johnson, president of Customer Growth Partners, a New Canaan-based retail consulting firm. "This is a mall that is trying to reinvent itself," Johnson said. "This Apple Store will definitely help, but it won't solve all its problems (attracting shoppers)." Johnson said a 140,000-square-foot addition to the mall's south side, which the Stamford Zoning Board approved this month, could pump new life into the shopping center. The project will replace the former Filene's department store with a glass-enclosed coterie of eight stores, pedestrian walkways, sidewalk restaurants and a new Tresser Boulevard entrance. |