At 6pm on Friday 7th December New York City’s third Apple Store opened its doors to a massive crowd of visitors and celebrities alike.
ifoAppleStore offers a fantastic write up of the entire event, as well as some candid photography around the store of the grand opening and of the local area.
“The crowd of about 800 on the 14th St. sidewalk began to spill over onto 9th Avenue, and eventually led all the way west onto 15th Street. Crowds of passersby began to form about 5 p.m. as the crowd grew, as workers who were headed home noticed the crowd and stopped to watch and take pictures,” reports ifo.
“At 6 p.m. the security team motioned in the crowd with the admonition, “Slow…slow,” and we went inside to a deafening roar–clapping and yelling and music–to grab our T-shirts and poster tubes. Three stories above, staffers crowded the rail and rimmed the staircase to provide applause and excitement. The crowd mostly made for the third floor where you redeemed any prizes, or hung out on the ground floor. And then everyone spotted Mary J. Blige on the second floor, palling around with Whoopi Goodberg. They both signed autographs and Blige posed for photos,” reports Gary Allen of ifoAppleStore.
iPhone poster highlighting New York City Apple Stores given out an West 14th Street Apple Store openingAllen continues, “By the time I left at 7:45 p.m. the line reached substantially west on 15th St. behind the store–I hand counted over 1,600 in line.”
The store is laid out in the following format;
- Ground Floor - MacBook Pros and MacBooks on tables with Mac Pro’s and iMacs flagging the walls.
- Second Floor - iPods, iPhone and accessories
- Third Floor - 45-foot genius bar, kids section, software shelving and some training tables.
“We are thrilled to open our third and largest store in Manhattan on West 14th Street,” said Ron Johnson, Apple’s senior vice president of Retail in a press release on Friday. “We think New Yorkers will love this stunning new location and the incredibly talented team we’ve assembled to make the Apple Store West 14th Street a place where people can shop, learn and truly be inspired.”
TheiLife.com is currently offering a video (Mirrored below) of the entire event as well as offering a write up of the prizes given out.
According to multiple sources including ifoAppleStore and TheiLife.com visitors to the store received a T-Shirt as well a poster tube which contained an iPhone poster (pictured left), on the cap of some poster tubes prizes were listed. Most won $10 iTunes gift cards but other prizes are reported as MacBooks, iMacs, iPod shuffles, and 16GB iPod touches.
Video below.
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