Young customers at the grand opening new Microsoft Store in San Diego’s Fashion Valley Shopping Center. (Microsoft)
Microsoft is planning to open a store at Oakbrook Center in Oak Brook by the end of the year, making the Chicago area one of just seven locations for the company’s new retail initiative.
The company announced the Oakbrook store last week at an analysts’ conference in Seattle and on its Microsoft Store Facebook page.
The first store opened in October 2009 in Scottsdale, Arizona. Microsoft has since added three locations in Mission Viejo, Calif., Lone Tree, Colo., and San Diego.
In addition to the Oakbrook Center store, the company will be opening outlets in Seattle and at the Mall of America in Minneapolis.
The stores will sell PCs, Xbox consoles, mobile phones, software and accessories. Shoppers can also get in-person technical support and training from employees.
“This is not a kind of idle marketing activity,” Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer told analysts, according to a transcript of his remarks. “We’re opening stores to sell stuff . . . We’ve seen nicely growing revenue through those stores. It’ll be great to have an exciting line of phones that we can put in those stores. Turns out, you can get a whole lot more revenue per square foot if you’re selling something other than just PCs, Xboxes and software.”
Microsoft hired former Wal-Mart Stores Inc. executive David Porter last year to head its retail store efforts.
Let’s hope they don’t staff the store entirely with 20-something geeks who only speak in technical jargon.
@regularguy: id rather have real IT workers tell me what’s wrong with my electronics than some guy at an apple store telling me my ipod is broken. no **** it is.
MS already has stores open across the US, they’re called Best Buy, Staples, Sears, Walmart, Office Max etcetera
I wonder where the store will be in relation to the Apple store — next door, I hope.