Apple to Open New Store in Melbourne on April 27th With Another Rumoured to be Opening Soon in Adelaide


By: Jeff Stewart  |   April 24th, 2013   |   Apple, Business, News

Apple has declared that it is going to open a new store in Melbourne, Australia on Saturday, April 27th. The Cupertino-based company will open the venue in the famous Highpoint Shopping Centre of Melbourne that is located in the western suburbs of the city. However, this will not be the first Apple store in Australia, as the California-based tech giant has already got 5 stores in the State of Victoria, but this certainly is the first site that Apple is going to inaugurate in Melbourne that is the second largest city of the country. Highpoint Shopping Centre is one of the most prominent malls in the city that houses 500 stores, which serves more than 15 million shoppers each year. The interesting thing about Apple’s Highpoint store is that rumour suggests it is located right over Samsung Experience store, which seems to have taken most of its design cues from Apple’s Store.

 

Apart from the Highpoint store, Macnn has reported that Apple also has intentions to open a store in Adelaide in the coming days. It is said that Apple has delayed the opening of its store after the initial designs of the site were rejected by the local planning authority about a year ago. A report from Adelaid Now has described the designs of the store as ‘unimaginative’ and ‘slavish’. Here is the excerpt from the report:

 

“The state’s peak planning body has rejected a revised ground-floor design for the new $384 million Rundle Place shopping centre – on the old Harris Scarfe site – after it was changed to fit specific shopfront requirements of an “international brand tenant” who will “be a significant drawcard to Rundle Mall” …

 

In his own submission to the DAC against the changes, the state Planning Department’s chief architect Philippe Mortier criticised the building design as putting “the manicured world image ahead of local amenity” and that it was an “unimaginative and disappointing slavish application of generic corporate style”.”

 

However, later Apple revised its designs and then submitted them and it appears that the latest designs have been approved by the local authority. If the aforementioned report turns out to be true and Apple opens a store in Adelaide then, it will be the 20th store from Apple in Australia. On the other hand, Apple has more than 400 stores across the globe, but interestingly stores on US soil are giving more revenue to the tech company as compared to all the other retail sites in the world.

 

Source: 9to5Mac

Photo: Apple

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