Part of the irony of Macworld Expo is this: during the very week when AtAT should be shining its brightest, the show actually broadcasts some of its worst episodes ever. They're short, or they're late (make that later), or they come across like they've been slapped together while the producers are sitting on a bus stuck in crosstown traffic. That's because we're trying to produce the show via dial-up in an unfamiliar location with a gazillion distractions all around while trying to cope with the added stress of travel and living out of a suitcase and doing all that on even less sleep than usual. We don't mind saying, it's a bit of a challenge.

It's because of that set of circumstances that we, your friendly neighborhood AtAT staff, still haven't even had a chance to listen to last Tuesday's quarterly earnings conference call yet. We're sure there are all sorts of fun little nuggets of interesting info buried therein, but we've simply been too busy to tune in so far. Thank heaven for MacNN, then, who skillfully compiled a handy list of fun conference call facts pertaining to everyone's favorite water cooler subject, the Apple retail initiative. Everybody knows that the opening weekend at the first two locations was a rousing success, but heck, given the Mac's loyal fan base, that was a given; the point of the stores isn't to cater to the faithful, but to convert the heathens that don't yet know the pleasure of the Macintosh way of life.

Well, the news is pretty much all good. In their first seven weeks in business, those two stores have served over 150,000 customers and are reporting "higher than expected sales and profits," and Apple execs are "very pleased" with the daily sales reports so far. Sales of third-party products and software are particularly impressive; Apple plans to double the number of software titles available at each location due to popular demand, so you can expect the shelves in Software Alley to get a little taller pretty soon. Apple is clearly doing retail right, because "both locations have become the highest-traffic stores" in their respective malls, with a stunning 89% of customers claiming to be either "extremely satisfied" or "very satisfied" with their shopping experience-- a statistic that bodes pretty darn well for the four new stores slated to open next month.

So if anything is going to pump up the Mac's market share numbers, we figure it's going to be the twenty-five retail stores that will be open and spreading the Mac gospel in time for the holiday shopping season. Get this: Apple expects more than half a million customers each and every week during the holiday season. That's a whole lotta eyeballs cruising for gift ideas. Now all the company needs is some low-priced LCD-based iMacs to hook the window shoppers before winter rolls around...