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iMac Drought (8/7/98)
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Apparently, resellers are resigned to their fate: they seem to be accepting the cold, hard fact that there's no way Apple can provide as many iMacs as they've been asked for. A Computer Retail Week article claims that several resellers are changing their "iMac Day" plans based on the "certainty" that they won't get as many iMacs as they ordered.
Apple's official stance on the iMac supply issue is that they are "planning" to have enough on hand, but they're "uncertain" if they can provide enough to fill the demand. Moreover, they've reportedly told several retailers that they should expect shortages. Unfortunately, they're not telling resellers exactly how short their orders will be, which is leaving store managers in a tizzy, unsure of just how hard to promote a machine that they may not actually have on hand to sell. And right now it looks like they won't know how many iMacs they'll have on launch day until the trucks actually show up with the boxes on board. Some CompUSA sales associates are even going so far as to predict that they won't even have enough iMacs on hand to fill all of the customer pre-orders they've taken.
Again, we can't stress this point enough-- if you're serious about getting an iMac as close to the launch date as possible, call around and place a pre-order at a reseller who hasn't already been swamped with them, if you can find one. Apple may yet pull off a miracle and supply enough iMacs to satisfy the initial demand, but if they can't, you want to make sure you're as close to the front of the line as possible. You've got nothing to lose, except the possibility of getting caught in a "Tickle Me Elmo"-style brawl as crazed Mac users all over enter the fray, fists a-flyin', transforming unfortunate CompUSA stores into smouldering heaps of blackened rubble. Hey, it could happen.
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SceneLink (917)
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And Now For A Word From Our Sponsors |
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 | | The above scene was taken from the 8/7/98 episode: August 7, 1998: The masses have spoken-- while Apple hoped to sell 400,000 iMacs this quarter, they have already received 350,000 pre-orders for a machine that won't even be out for another week. Meanwhile, Apple kicks into high gear to minimize the inevitable iMac drought caused by record demand, and Robert Cringely claims that not only is Apple having trouble building the systems quickly enough, they're also experiencing some pretty serious quality problems, to boot...
Other scenes from that episode: 916: T-minus Seven Days (8/7/98) There's only one week left before the iMac is officially released, and we'll all finally see if the demand lives up to the hype. Rumors about rampant pre-orders continue to fly, fueling the frenzied anticipation of what has the potential to be one of the best-selling computers in the history of the industry... 918: Cringing in the Corner (8/7/98) One of the pundits who claims to have actual numbers on how many iMacs Apple has been able to produce thus far is Robert Cringely, self-appointed martyr to the flaming email arrows of many a Mac EvangeLista...
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