Apple’s iconic glass tower at its Pudong, Shanghai, store.
In 2010, with Steve Jobs at the helm, Apple vowed to open 25 new stores in China over the next two years. But it never happened. Tim Cook renewed the promise back in late 2014 – and this month we see the company has hit the target ahead of schedule.
Apple has just announced two new stores in China that will launch in the next couple of weeks. Those bring the tally of Apple Stores in China to 40, up from 15 when Cook said the expansion would start.
There are now 36 in the mainland plus four in Hong Kong.
As noticed by Apple Insider, the two newest stores are in Shanghai (the sixth in the city) and Tianjin (its second one).
Apple’s fulfilling its China promise may have more to do with its retail boss, Angela Ahrendts, than with the CEO. Ahrendts joined Apple in early 2014, leaving her post as Burberry CEO to rejuvenate the official Apple Stores and speed up their global expansion.
Apple stole Angela Ahrendts away from Burberry at the end of 2013. She started the job in early 2014. That year she was Apple’s top-paid exec. Photo credit: Fortune Live Media.
Apple’s most recent quarterly financials may have been the company’s worst in more than a decade, but the huge popularity of the iPhone in China, particularly since the iPhone 6 came out in 2014, has created a huge surge in revenue from the country.
The “greater China” area – the mainland, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan all grouped together – accounted for nearly double the revenue of Japan and the rest of the entire Asia-Pacific area combined at its peak at the end of 2015.
Despite the ups and downs, Apple’s China revenue is trending upwards – and the company sees its own official stores in major cities as an important part of the strategy to win over the country’s large middle class.
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