Gene Munster of the Piper Jaffray investment firm, known for snooping around to gather data about Apple, did exactly that this Black Friday when he sent his team over to the Mall of America in Minneapolis to monitor foot traffic and sales. They spied on the Apple Store for eight hours, but this year they also spent some time — approximately two hours — at the Microsoft retail store right across the way.
They found a few primary statistics. There was 47 percent less foot traffic in the Microsoft Store compared to the Apple Store during the hours they were monitoring. However, Munster notes that while traffic was up for the Apple Store this year, sales were down, and he links this shortage of supply as well as interest in the new iPad mini.
Because the Apple Store had more feet walking around, it’s no surprise that sales were also up compared to Microsoft’s. At the Apple store, customers bought an average of 17.2 items per hour, while the Microsoft Store sold only 3.5 items per hour. Additionally, every purchase Gene Munster’s crew noted was an Xbox game except for two.
Lastly, the Apple Store in Minneapolis managed to sell 11 iPads per hour. Over in the Microsoft wing where the Surface is the reigning tablet, well, sales weren’t as good. Microsoft sold 11 less. That’s correct: not a single Surface tablet was sold at the Microsoft Store in the two hours Gene Munster’s team monitored the place.
Now to be fair, only spent eight hours at one Apple Store in the entire country on Black Friday and only two hours at one Microsoft Store. That doesn’t necessarily represent other stores across America, but let’s be realistic — would you really be that surprised if these stats were consistent throughout?