Google Has ‘No Plans’ To Launch Retail Stores

That's too bad, a store dedicated to Android devices (phones and tablets, maybe just nexus devices), chromeOS laptops, glass, TV, whatever that home video sphere thing was, etc. would compete very nicely with Apple stores.

I thought the point in time they chose to open them was pretty good. You can sell a mobile phone with video and text. But with something groundbreaking like the Glass this can be harder. Potential customers have nothing they can compare this to. They can watch the glass promo clips, of course but I think experiencing this first hand is way more intense and can be a strong incentive to buy one.<p>Of course, since there are Retail Stores planned, this whole argument is moot. To bad.

It is very difficult to convince non-technical people to buy technology they cannot see, touch, try and in a general sense, "feel". Because you know, non-technical people do not know what "specs" are.<p>And they also do not browse the internet like geeks.<p>If people go to apple.com, they "see" things, or even at amazon.com.<p>The simple question is: where does my mom have to go to buy a Nexus 7? Certainly not to google.com, not even nexus.com.<p>Yes, 4.7 million people have bought a nexus 7 (or 4, whatever). The first-gen iPad (which nobody would buy anyway) reached 3 million in 80 days.<p>People SAW it. At apple.com. And then they saw their friends'.<p>Ditto the Galaxy. You see: samsung.com, as easy as that. The S-II sold 5 million units in 85 days.

I think having Google retail stores would've been great and given them some exposure and credibility with people less familiar with phones. That said, I would have also found it unusual given their push to sell things in the Play Store and the fact that they don't have <i>that</i> much hardware to sell.

I think having the retail stores would have forced the support issue very quickly. Not responding to e-mail is one thing, but having an unhappy customer standing in your store is quite another.