Apple Opens Massive New Nanjing East Retail Store in Shanghai

Holly crap, that is a lot of Apple Store employees!!

lol

But china does not have tea party. So they progress while you 'assemble'. lol

Article is of Chinese store. Apple stores in china show progress toward middle class. Is painful for you to see? Why so angry? :rolleyes:

But we innovate while they blindly produce what we created :D

Wow, lot's of blue shirts. First pic looks like an army ready for battle.

Not only does Apple have more money than the Federal government, they will have more employees than the army!

Hmmm... Are we absolutely positive this is a REAL Apple Store? ;)

These store openings are getting dull.

How about putting them on 'blog', not the front page.

"MacRumors, new and rumors you care about"... really?

All I'm sayin is, if they've spent all this time and money erecting all these stores, I sure as hell hope the same can be said about the upcoming iPhone.

16,000 sq ft is larger than a lot of Best Buys! All to support one brand. Pretty neat.

Yeah but Best Buy has like 2000 stores. Apple would have to build a bunch to beat that. But I'd rather have 400 Apple stores than 2000 Best Buy stores.

And, like you said, it's all for one brand, which is impressive.

Hey I live in Shanghai and I just registered to correct a few incorrect statements made in this thread.

1. China, well more accurately Shanghai and Hong Kong, has a very large middle and upper class that LOVES Apple products. I'm posting this from an consulting office full of entry-level Chinese workers right out of college, and almost everyone has an iPhone 4. Skilled wages are not that low. Apple is, believe it or not, actually more popular here than in the US.

2. Someone said that iPhones must cost less here, and then someone else said that they cost the same. Both wrong. An iPhone 4 here actually costs MORE than in the US. Even with the much lower average income, convert the RMB price to $USD and it comes out about 25% more expensive.

If that confuses you, you don't know Shanghai culture. People here spend TONS on luxury items. A huge portion of their income. So much money has flowed into this city in the past decade or so that is has affected people psychologically. There's a huge gap between the middle/upper and the poor, and because locally made products tend to be very cheap, the #1 status symbol is Western products, especially American. Everything from McDonalds (considered a medium quality restaurant here, even though local food is so much better) to designer clothes has a jacked up price because of the Western brand name. The income in many families here has skyrocketed as of late, but the cost of living has stayed low, so people blow their cash on Apple products.


3. It is true that unskilled labor jobs like Apple store employee make almost NOTHING here. That's why they can afford to hire so many. Labor here is extraordinarily cheap. For example, its considered unusual here to not have someone come clean your house for you, even in middle-lower income households. Department stores have staffed demonstration counters for almost every product. Virtually every restaurant in the city has delivery, even McDonalds.

And just generally for people who don't know whats going on in China, Shanghai is so rich it takes weeks for the shock to wear off. From the amazing restaurants, to the lavish bars and nightclubs, to the constant sight of Ferrari's and Porsche's, to the grand party's almost every night ( I went to one with Dwayne Wade a few weeks ago), this city is the Mecca of consumer culture. To call it communist is hilarious.

However, travel too far from Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Beijing (which is the poorest of the 3 by far) and you enter a truly 3rd world country. People say China is the future, but the country is only tenuously held together. This is China's chance to take control of the world, but their success is far from guaranteed.

I think it is fantastic, the store looks great, and has created a lot of jobs!

I still don't know how a store this big can work in China... how can so many Chinese afford Apple products? In the USA, they are very expensive... easily 2x or more of a similar product made by other companies (ie Macbooks)

I guess the products are priced cheaper there, but if so, I wonder just how much cheaper?

China is the future mate, the West is in decline :cool: