The "Surface Conspiracy!?" Or Just Marketing misfire

[Saint Michael]

Get me a plane ticket there, I'll take my golf clubs with me too. Heads, gonna roll.

Norway is gonna back Your play. That guy needs a good wooping

 

[thetawave]

Gken

The store in Louisville Ky on Shelbyville Rd has a dedicated Apple rep to work their kiosk. He does an excellent job representing Apple and is very knowledgable. If you are every in that area and need something Apple related, he is your man. Apple products sell very well at this location because of his interaction and knowledge of the product, his people skills along with a good product. I did demos at that location for Lexmark and Sony and was amazed at the attention the Apple area received. The Surface tablet needs a similar setup in order to let people know how great this tablet is...

 

[zzdarkwingduck]

I checked the BB out in stafford, va at lunch, Surface was jammed next to a couple other tablets. Did see a couple guys there just to look at them and were going to buy them. Probably did their research online and just wanted to see it in person before making the final decision. Best buy will continue to degrade and disappear if they keep this business model up. I remember reading how the CEO wanted to restructure the entire company and follow apple's customer oriented service model, but shareholders and upper management tried to crucify him cause it would cost too much money to restructure that way.

 

[inteller]

Gken

The store in Louisville Ky on Shelbyville Rd has a dedicated Apple rep to work their kiosk. He does an excellent job representing Apple and is very knowledgable. If you are every in that area and need something Apple related, he is your man. Apple products sell very well at this location because of his interaction and knowledge of the product, his people skills along with a good product. I did demos at that location for Lexmark and Sony and was amazed at the attention the Apple area received. The Surface tablet needs a similar setup in order to let people know how great this tablet is...

that was the point of the MS holiday stores. MS should just lease space inside the store and staff it with their own people. That's the only way they can guarantee a quality presentation.

 

[rebornempowered]

I have a friend who is handicapped that I have helped decide that a Surface is the best device for him. We can pin all his favorite websites to the start screen and using a stylus (he currently uses the eraser end of a pencil on a laptop touchpad) he can use the touch screen interface with ease.

Anyway, I haven't been able to get him hooked up with his new Surface yet because I have had to be out of town. This morning we talked on the phone. He was at our local mall this past weekend and he wheeled his chair into the Best Buy Mobile store there. He wanted to play with the Surface while waiting for his wife. He asked if they had it. The gentleman working there told him that they would never carry it because Microsoft wanted them to sell it for less than cost and they weren't going to buckle to Microsoft. My friend asked if the "big store" was going to have them. He also replied no for the same reason.

I informed him that manager or salesperson was full of bovine excrement and that we would get him his shiny new Surface on Thursday at Best Buy or Staples. Microsoft needs to find a way to get this situation under control. People are just making up crap. <rant>If they were my employee I would fire them on the spot. I don't care if you don't like a product you get the sales you can get. It is not your job to convince people to buy your favorite product. Do that on your own time?</rant>

 

[jiayit]

Maybe this'll make you feel slightly better (or much worst)
http://www.theverge.com/2012/12/17/3778082/a-rant-about-the-surface-at-best-buy

"I've heard that it runs Microsoft's own special version of Android that makes it work a lot like a laptop." << what the salesman said.

 

[thetawave]

Wow Jiayit...I see that its just not me. Thanks for the info. I have actually contacted Microsoft Retail Department...information below...because of the obvious disregard for the Surface and Microsoft. Feel free to do the same. Maybe if enough people make some noise something can be done.

Microsoft Retail Department (for retail stores) 877-877-0037 8778770037 M-F 5 AM-5 PM PST

 

[power5]

I would say the reason there are no touch covers is due to theft issues. ****, I could walk in and click it onto my surface I had brought in for "geek squad help" and walk out with it. I mean I guess they could put another RFID tag on it to go off if passed through the detectors.


Also I bet if you asked any of these BB employees about an android you would find them just reading the tags to you. "It has 32gb of storage and runs 4.0." "Ok, anything special about what this samsung tablet has that the others dont?" "Uh, I don't think so."

"Which ipad is this?" "The new one." "Does it have the a5x chip in it then?" "Uh, I think so, its really fast."

 

[runamuck83]

I witnessed the same weak display at my local best buy today. Surface was in a row of Android tablets at the very end where no one would care to look. Meanwhile, the iPad display is is prominent and glowing glorious white, drawing all attention.

 

[Derausgewanderte]

I posted this on XDA. I had some really weird experience at the local BB in Ohio. The Staples store on the other hand was well setup and I purchased my 64Gb version there.

 

[rebornempowered]

I had an indifferent experience purchasing Surface for my friend at the Best Buy in Sioux Falls, SD. I found the display pretty quickly. It was in the middle of a bunch of Android tablets but it was clear what it was. The salesperson came over. I expected him to be a like the other people that work there and try to convince me to get an Apple product but he helped me make sure I was getting the version of it without the touch cover.

Basically the dude did his job. I was fully prepared to say "I wonder how your manager feels about you convincing me to spend $500 at Staples" but this was actually not a terrible experience like I have had at Best Buy in the past.

 

[stephen_az]

I tried to see one at BestBuy in Geneva IL. Couldn't see one anywhere and asked someone in the PC/MAC section if they had one set up. The guy looked at me like I was stupid and pointed me to the iPad's. I said I read that BB was supposed to be selling Surface now and they should have one on display. He then said he heard WP8 sucked and BB was more than likely waiting for the 1st service pack before they start selling them??? I said Surface doesn't even run WP8! The guy then just walked off.

I left the store really pissed off. I hope MS goes in there and knocks some heads.

....again, did you relay the information to anyone who counts or are you just ranting about it here? District managers, account managers, and Microsoft distributors are not psychic and are not hanging around here. If you have a gripe stop waiting for someone else to fix it for you. Bring it to the attention of the people who can address it.

 

[stephen_az]

I witnessed the same weak display at my local best buy today. Surface was in a row of Android tablets at the very end where no one would care to look. Meanwhile, the iPad display is is prominent and glowing glorious white, drawing all attention.

In the BB's I have entered in the past week (one in Tempe, AZ and one in Scottsdale, AZ) there are two Windows tablet displays. One is in the phone section immediately inside the entrance and the other is in the computer section - both are stand alone setups. They also have the Asus RT tablet on display which actually looks rather nice. The local Sam's Club also has the Asus RT tablet on display with the other non-iPad tablets.

 

[stephen_az]

I had an indifferent experience purchasing Surface for my friend at the Best Buy in Sioux Falls, SD. I found the display pretty quickly. It was in the middle of a bunch of Android tablets but it was clear what it was. The salesperson came over. I expected him to be a like the other people that work there and try to convince me to get an Apple product but he helped me make sure I was getting the version of it without the touch cover.

Basically the dude did his job. I was fully prepared to say "I wonder how your manager feels about you convincing me to spend $500 at Staples" but this was actually not a terrible experience like I have had at Best Buy in the past.

What was indifferent about the experience? It sounds like you went in to buy it, and walked out with it.

 

[Rich White]

Staples gave it a nice endcap with great signage. Bright, Shiny, New. Also -- too expensive for my purposes. The Lenovo Yoga at $1449 could replace my ultrabook and be a step up, The Surface pro is too memory limited for my purposes. The RT is cute but its basically a streamer with Office. Nice travel book

 

[chuks22]

the retail experiences mentioned here sounds horrible, with regards to best buy. prob why they couldnt make it in the UK. over here we dont take poor customer service. u be out of buisness

 

[thetawave]

The "Surface Conspiracy!?" Or Just Marketing misfire...update to original post.

Well folks the Surface tablet still is being misrepresented at your local Best Buy, or at least my location. I have carefully observed the Surface tablet and the peoples curiosity with this product over the past week and people are really liking what the Surface tablet offers. I did however run into a slight problem in the tablet section where the Surface tablet was displayed. First problem is the tablet is in the middle of android and asus offerings. But even at that disappointing position the tablet stands out. Accept that today there was an error on the screen that read "Preparing Automatic Repair". I asked one of the associates what happened to the tablet and he said, "Oh it was set up wrong". Interestingly enough it was working just fine the day before. I took matters in my own hand and saw that there was a reset button so I took that route and within a few minutes it was back online. Oddly enough the Geek Squad manager saw that I was fixing the error and watched me closely. During the repair time several people came up to ask me about the Tablet so I just started to talk about the feature sets. One guy wanted the Tablet and off the manager went to get one for him. Mission accomplished!

I spoke with the store manager about the display of the Surface tablet and explained that he will lose sales if it is not properly displayed and that there is a lot of interest in the product. He said he would look into the situation. During our discussion a customer came up and asked about the tablet, right on queue. He saw that they weren't ready. I think this situation will get fixed slowely but as interest grows that pace will probably quicken especially if revenue is lost. Attached is a picture...