Here's something you don't see every day. Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) ran into a bit of a speed bump in China last week over what was supposed to be the launch of the iPhone 4S.
The device was set to go on sale on Jan. 13, prompting loyalists to camp out overnight at the Beijing Sanlitun Apple retail store, similar to their domestic counterparts. A key difference is that local temperatures were as low as minus 9 degrees Celsius, which is enough to test the resolve of any devotee.
The store had advertised that it would open early at 7 a.m., and when the front door failed to open on time, impatient (and cold) customers got a bit unruly. By 7:15, they began to chant "open the door!" and yell "liars!" And when an unidentified man announced the device wouldn't go on sale that day, things got out of hand.
Source: M.I.C. Gadget; Beijing SWAT controlling the crowd
Customers began hurling eggs at the location, and violence erupted between scalpers and hopeful buyers, according to local Chinese tech blog M.I.C. Gadget. Scalping the device is so profitable that the adventurous types even form teams to maximize how many iPhones they can flip. A Beijing SWAT team was soon called in to try to quell the uprising and attempt to control the massive crowd that had formed.
In response, Apple has decided to suspend in-store sales at any of its Beijing and Shanghai locations "for the time being" out of safety concerns for customers and employees. Apple is redirecting prospective buyers to the online store, other authorized resellers, and its only official carrier in China, China Unicom (NYSE: CHU).
The debacle shows that Apple still has a lot of work to do in expanding its retail distribution footprint in its fastest-growing geography. Not only does it need to extend carrier partnerships to China Mobile (NYSE: CHL) and China Telecom (NYSE: CHA), but it also needs to build more stores. Both carriers will inevitably be brought on, with China Mobile being the biggest carrier and China Telecom making progress in the regulatory front.
Apple has only six official retail stores in China, so there's plenty of room for growth. Building more stores would ease the traffic and spread out the masses, which is clearly needed. Stateside, Apple is further expanding into Target (NYSE: TGT) locations with mini-stores, similar to those found at other third-party retailers like Best Buy. Apple needs to ink more reseller partnerships like the one with Target within China.
While this fiasco is certainly a misstep in China and Apple has its work cut out to capitalize within the nation, Cupertino will recover and unlock the massive potential there. China is one reason you can still buy Apple.
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