The Friendliest Store in the Mall | Ron Johnson Built the Apple Store

James Altucher (0:01)

Evening.

SPEAKER_2 (0:02)

Buyers' Remorse.

SPEAKER_3 (0:03)

Buy a new car?

SPEAKER_2 (0:04)

I'll be moving in.

SPEAKER_3 (0:06)

Let's get started.

SPEAKER_2 (0:07)

Uh, sorry, I think there's been a mistake.

Ron Johnson (0:09)

I bought it from Carvana.

SPEAKER_2 (0:11)

You what?

SPEAKER_3 (0:11)

Yeah, great price.

SPEAKER_2 (0:12)

I even have seven days to love it or return it. So there's no... No, no Buyers' Remorse. More like Buyers' Rejoice?

I guess I'll let myself out. Congratulations. I mean it. Buyers' Rejoice. Buy your car today on Carvana. Limitations and exclusions may apply. See our seven-day return policy at carvana.com.

SPEAKER_3 (0:33)

Today on The James Altucher Show.

Ron Johnson (0:37)

In the technology world, people tend to be living in their heads.

You're thinking about products and chipsets and software, and you're kind of here. In my world, you're living in your heart. That's what a retailer does. It's all about the human impact of what you do. When you walked into other technology world, you saw some employees. They didn't look like people you'd want to meet. They were kind of techie, kind of guys.

Didn't make a lot of eye contact. They were having their heads in their products like tinkering. You know, they love to play with products. That's why they worked there. They didn't work there for customers. And it felt very different. It wasn't a place you felt welcome, especially if you're new to technology. It was intimidating to the near mortals. And suddenly the Apple Store was the friendliest, most inviting store in the mall.

SPEAKER_3 (1:34)

This isn't your average business podcast, and he's not your average host. This is The James Altucher Show.

James Altucher (1:53)

I love The Apple Store. Like I could just go into the Apple Store and just look at the products. I just feel good. I remember the first time I bought an iPod, it's like 20 or over 20 years ago, in the Apple Store on Fifth Avenue in New York City.

I was in heaven. I was smiling so much.

And that feeling was designed on purpose by the guy who's on the show today, Ron Johnson. He created all the Apple Stores and he's the author of the new book, Shop Different. So Ron spent years at Target proving that design could matter in a world where it seemed like nobody cared. And Steve Jobs, who obviously cared so much about design, Steve Jobs noticed. Steve Jobs realized Mac wasn't a commodity. It was something you had to feel with your hands. You had to look at. You had to see the beauty of. No store in America was built for that. So Ron built one. No boxes, no pressure, no clerks hiding behind registers, just tables and light. And everyone said it would fail. Retail experts wrote the obituary before the doors opened. And for a minute, they looked right. The third store opened in Texas. And by Monday morning, in all the city of Texas, he hadn't sold a single computer. So Steve looked at Ron in the weekly executive meeting. What are you doing here? You haven't sold a computer yet in the state of Texas. So Ron fixed it. And within a few years, Apple Stores were making more money per square foot than Tiffany's. This guy is a retail genius. I've learned so much from talking to him. That's who's here today. The guy who can walk into any store and tell you what gives it a heartbeat or what is quietly killing it. Here's Ron Johnson, author of Shop Different.

Oh, I loved it. And you know, it's so interesting. Like, I mean, we'll talk about this in the podcast, but you're you're like an artist. And to really see how you think, like when I go in the store, you're looking at you're like you're like Magnus Carlsen on the chessboard. And you know, when you look at a store, you see so many patterns and ideas and things. And that's what's really inspiring in your book to really see how how a master of something thinks about his domain. And that's really special.

Ron Johnson (4:13)

I wrote it like in the third person and tried to be a fly on the wall inside meetings. But then I said, I think people want to know what was in my head. So I went to the first person really tried to expand them what I was thinking all the time.

And I think that made the book a lot more interesting to read.

James Altucher (4:32)

And I think it's good, like, you know, the rhythm of it, or, you know, you start with, you know, Steve Jobs' interview. And it kind of like dovetails his managerial style, you know, throughout while you're building these stores. I'm struggling to figure out where to start because I'm so fascinated even when you're at Target and you're going into the Walmart in Florida and analyzing, you know, the length for two shopping carts and how they didn't have as many products per category. So you were able to play with design and more like that's all fascinating stuff. But I wanted to, I guess the proper way to do is to jump right into, you know, the Apple Store and then we can kind of weave back.