Surface Tablets Expanding into Non-Microsoft Stores?

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A Bad Day

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[citation][nom]Krog216[/nom]There are brick and mortar Microsoft stores?[/citation]

Uh, there's a thing called Best Buy, Staples, Office Max, Walmart, and Target.
 

wemakeourfuture

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[citation][nom]Krog216[/nom]There are brick and mortar Microsoft stores?[/citation]

I've been to one. A complete copy of Apple at every level.
At my local Microsoft store they even leased the space right next to Apple and have the setup exactly the same as Apple.

Surface was DOA when they did not want stores like Best Buy, Staples, Walmart etc to sell it.

When people (like you) don't even know they have stores, don't really buy from them online, nor have seen the product, who is going to pre-order this? Not many. When they try to charge around the same as an iPad, who is going to buy it? Not many. When they release 2 version RT & Pro, how many are going to commit to buying one? Not many.

Hence why Microsoft's projection of 4 million RT sold are being reduced to 2 million and are more realistically being estimated at 1.3 million.
 

A Bad Day

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[citation][nom]wemakeourfuture[/nom]I've been to one. A complete copy of Apple at every level. At my local Microsoft store they even leased the space right next to Apple and have the setup exactly the same as Apple.[/citation]

Burger King also does that sometimes. They would wait for McDonald to do the research and make the move, and then build their own restaurant right across the street.
 
This was a move that should have been done within a week of its release. Until people know what Surface can do, people are not going to buy it online, site unseen. It'll be interesting to see how much this move helps.
 

bigdragon

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Microsoft is late to the party as usual. There are Microsoft stores about an hour and a half away from me, but they're very difficult to get to with traffic and then parking problems. Microsoft set up a kiosk in an easier-to-get-to mall about 45 minutes away. However, when I visited they only had Surface RT tablets and someone was returning one for failing to run their favorite programs (duh). Putting Surface RT in regular stores like Best Buy is a no-brainer. Having held back from those retail outlets shows how clueless Microsoft's management is. Apple continues to run circles around them.

Microsoft really needs to clean house. It's been one blunder after another with Surface and Windows 8. I can easily see Surface going the way of Zune in a year or two.
 
They need to expand to the retail store so people can actually see the thing and use it and feel the difference between the covers when typing and get an idea of what they're buying rather than dump $700 online for something they have only seen in Youtube videos.
 
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If Microsoft does not start selling in other retail stores, the Surface will continue to get poor to modest sales. Many people have never heard of Microsoft stores, and those who have don't want to drive hours just to try one out. Even in the surface TV ads they do not tell people where to get the Surface, regardless of if you see it on TV and want it, you're not going to know where to get it. Even Apple doesn't restrict its iPads to Apple stores, why should Microsoft do it if they have a fraction of the stores?
 

halcyon

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This is the kind of thing that makes MS seem completely and irrevocably clueless. I would love to hear the logic behind them thinking their product was so good that they could withold it from the big retail chains and still do well. Even Apple who might get away with that isn't asinine enough to actually try it.
 
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I've been to the Microsoft Store, yes it's very similar to the Apple Store but let's be honest, Apple copied their concept from others ;)

I'm holding out for my Christmas bonus, I will personally be buying a Surface RT tablet. I have played with one and love it, do recommend the type cover though. Great device and you might be surprised just how many apps there are for it. May not be 500,000 but I don't I don't need the "pop my zit" or "Hello Kitty" app on my device...
 
They had better move into non-MS stores! I finally visited my local MS shop today and the employees hardly know what a computer is, and are convinced that the color of a box is the ultimate selling point of a computer.

On the other hand I did like the overall layout of the store. They just need to hire some intelligent life.
 
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The employees at the M$ stores come from the closed, Best Buy slack jawed yokel, employee barrel at the local unemployment office in Frostbite Falls! Intermixed with cletus you will also find a few marketing majors, Green around the gills, and one M$ "super" expert, kept in a cage, locked away in the back of the stock/employee break room, that I suspect is just a red telephone with a direct link to the M$ store home office helpline somewhere south of (pick any overcrowded city on the indian subcontinent).
 

halcyon

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We have a MS stand in our local mall and it just seems like such a me-too endeavor that its really a challenge to give it much respect. However, I didn't want to artificially hate it so I did stop by and look at a Surface RT. Of course the sales guy decided he was going to educate poor dumb me about how great it was. I was honest and told him that I've managed my music with iTunes for years (I know there's alternatives but I'm fine with what I'm using for now). I and asked how Surface would address that. He asked me if my music was in MP3. I said "...some of it." He proceeded to tell me that all my music should be in MP3 format. I politely terminated our conversation and left. I won't necessarily blame MS for the sales-tech's ignorance but I was not impressed.
 
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An impressive blend of art and engineering;
Classy, quality, brilliant, futuristic, well thought-out, and good attention to detail;

Full-featured full-strengths fully-fledged versatile no-tracking no-spying and long-trusted OS;

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Insanely-long support useful lifecycle, more hardware-vendor choices, one-OS one-user-interface for all your computer devices (from phone, tablet, notebook, desktop, all-in-one, TV, car ...? from 4" to 152"?);

An integrated keyboard-cover, in addition to the multiple choices of on-screen keyboards and pen input;

A tablet hybrid in magnesium casing with a clicking leg, for the fun-loving consumers (live-windows-tiles interface) and the power users as well;
Compatible at home, work, and on the road;

It charms in your hands, thrives on the table, and sleeps in your briefcase;
Play better, work smarter!

It does not end here, as you mature, it grows too for many many years to come.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vmxqm8Qii-E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=INNrmVQSmkA&NR=1
 

rodnav

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the reason that Microsoft is only now sending the surface to other retailers is probably because they didn't have enough units to place on the shelves... Same reason that apple doesn't launch its hardware at all it's apple stores worldwide at the same time, other countries receive theirs a month or more after North America... the production hasn't ramped up to supply all the units for the display shelves yet....
 
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maxcloud of sulfurous bad odor is all I can imagine for such Redmond inspired marketing drivel. More like uses the same poorly constructed UI that hinders productivity on the desktop and is a jack of all trades and an expert at none! With a driect chain that binds the user to the App Store and a lifetime of shoddy apps, dressed up with annoying rectangles and squares that flash the most completely useless information, all the while sending back marketing metrics, so as to be able to bombard its users with more of such marketing drivel!
 

DRosencraft

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Is this what we've devolved to? Arguing who came up with the idea of a store selling your company's products? Look, Microsoft doesn't have the product array to support a store of their own. Even Apple has started to move away from selling their stuff only in their own stores.

As noted, there likely needed some time to amass supply for release to retail partners, and wanted to do it after both the Pro and RT models were for release. The question is whether this will help sales significantly. We can assume sales pace will increase simply because there are more of them out there, but how much will they increase?
 

universal remonster

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I would love to hear the logic behind them thinking their product was so good that they could withold it from the big retail chains and still do well. Even Apple who might get away with that isn't asinine enough to actually try it.

I'm curious if it has anything to do with the OEM's whining and crying about Microsoft building hardware in the first place. Remember, some of them expressed great concern that MS could undercut and price the OEM's out of the Surface market while also having the nicest build quality of them all. Perhaps keeping to Microsoft only stores through 2012 was some sort of agreement with the OEM's to try and ease their concerns and keep them as software customers. I also wonder if that is why Microsoft waited until the very last minute to announce price. Let the OEM's set the market price, then MS sets their price accordingly. I have a feeling judging by all of the very early talk that MS was looking to launch at a much cheaper price on both the RT and Pro, but followed the OEM's lead and happily made more profit. This is all just my opinion, but it all started adding up over time leading to the Surface launch.
 
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