If you’d told anybody, ten years ago, that Apple would not only have specialty retail outlets in finer malls across America, but those stores would be as highly coveted as other municipal boondoggles like stadiums for sports teams that suck or gigantic monuments, everybody would have laughed at you.
Well, nobody’s laughing now, as cities scramble to do everything short of sell under-performing school classes into slavery to get an Apple Store.
Reports the Next Web:
A recent ABC News report states that Apple is going to open a new store in Salt Lake City, located in City Creek. The company already has one store in the the Utah city but thanks to what appears to be a massive retail incentive, it may open a new store before the end of the year.
What is the big incentive? According to ABC’s sources, City Creek has offered a “major concession package” that is thought to include five years free rent.
To be fair though, cities generally get something out of the deal. For example, in Grand Central Terminal in NYC, Apple shelled out $2.5 million of its own money in improvements. Additionally, it’s been shown that Apple Stores drive traffic and sales to other retailers (Apple fanboys and fangirls usually have disposable income and are famous for being willing to travel to visit the existing stores), making it kind of an anti-Wal-Mart.
So, unlike most of these corporate sweetheart deals, which pretty much can be made analogous to covering yourself in grease and tying yourself to a barrel, at least Apple is being gentle in how it abuses the situation. It might even give you a call tomorrow, baby.
(HT: Ars Technica. Pic via Shutterstock)