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Four years ago, I took my kids to Amsterdam. After a long day of touring museums and canals, they started to whine. Then I hit upon the perfect bribe: look, there’s the Apple store. After half an hour of playing with iPads, iMacs and iPhones, they were all smiles as we walked back to the hotel.
四年前，我带几个孩子去阿姆斯特丹。在参观了一整天博物馆、运河之后，他们开始叫苦。在那时，我突然发现了一个可以讨好他们的完美地点：看，那有一家苹果(Apple)商店。孩子们在那里玩了半小时ipad、iMac和iPhone，当我们步行回酒店时，他们满脸笑容。
Their enthusiasm helps illustrate why Apple stores are generally considered the world’s most successful. Their glass walls and wooden tables full of gadgets generate far more sales per square foot than any big retail competitor.
他们的热情有助于解释，为什么苹果商店通常被认为是全球最成功的商店。玻璃幕墙和木质桌子上满是各种电子小玩意儿，这里每平方英尺产生的销售额远超任何大型零售业竞争对手。
This brings us to Thursday’s launch of Angela Ahrendts’ new vision for the company’s retail outlets. The former Burberry chief executive, who was given a stock grant worth up to $68m on her arrival at the tech group, has spent the past two years rethinking its offering as its product range changes. The result, unveiled in San Francisco on the 15th anniversary of the first Apple store opening, will be rolled out across many of the group’s 400 stores in 18 countries.
上周四，安杰拉•阿伦茨(Angela Ahrendts)推出了自己为苹果零售店所做的新设计。曾担任博柏利(Burberry)首席执行官的阿伦茨被挖到苹果时，获得了这家科技集团提供的价值最高达6800万美元的赠股。过去两年，随着苹果产品线的变化，她一直在思考如何改造苹果商店的呈现方式。在首家苹果商店开业15周年之际，全新设计的苹果商店在旧金山揭幕，该集团位于全球18个国家的400家商店中，许多都将应用这一全新设计。
Mostly, her vision seems to involve even bigger glass doors and lots of plants. Every flagship store will have outdoor space — in San Francisco, the greenery-lined square will feature free WiFi and acoustic musicians on weekends. The Genius Bar, where customers go for help with technical issues, has been replaced by a Genius Grove stocked with trees and more space for people to sit while they wait. Tart commentators suggested the tree money might have been better spent on more staff to keep delays down.
总体看来，她的设计似乎包括了比以前还要大的玻璃门以及大量的植物。每家旗舰店都将拥有室外空间——在旧金山店，绿树成荫的广场将覆盖免费WiFi，每逢周末还有音乐家现场演奏。帮助顾客解决技术问题的“天才吧”(Genius Bar)被树木成排的“天才林”(Genius Grove)取代，为等待的顾客提供更多坐下休息的空间。但刻薄的评论人士称，植树花费的钱或许还不如用于增加人手，以减少各种延误。
On the more practical side, Apple staff will include “creative pros” who can advise customers on how to use its technology for photography and making music. And it plans to woo small businesses with a dedicated area called the boardroom. The jargon is a bit sickening, but this probably reflects a sensible effort by the company to broaden its offerings with revenue from iPhones falling.
更实用的举措是，苹果商店将纳入“创意专业人士”为自己的员工，他们能为顾客提供如何利用苹果技术拍照和制作音乐的建议。苹果还计划利用所谓“董事会议室”的专门区域吸引小型企业。这样做有点招人反感，但在iPhone销售收入下滑之际，该公司此举或许不失为扩大业务的明智之举。
Apple says that it is responding to the fact that customers now go online for simple transactions and expect something more unique from actual stores. “It is kind of our fault that retail is changing,” said Ms Ahrendts. “Therefore, we realised that we needed to do something different with our physical space.”
苹果表示，它是在回应这一现实，即：简单的交易，顾客如今都在线上进行；在实体店里，他们期待能有更独特的体验。“零售业正在转变，我们负有几分责任。”阿伦茨说，“因此，我们意识到，需要让我们的实体空间变得稍微与众不同一些。”
This is not the first time Ms Ahrendts has sought to transform the shopping experience. Back in 2012 she reopened Burberry’s flagship London store, telling reporters it was designed to be the physical manifestation of the company’s “Burberry World Live” website. The media swooned, saying that the shop, which swapped out tills for roving sales staff with swipe machines, was a manifestation of the luxury group’s revolutionary digital-first approach.
这并非阿伦茨首次试图改变购物体验。她在2012年就重新打造了博柏利的伦敦旗舰店，并对记者表示，设计理念是，让该店以实体形式呈现公司的“博柏利世界直播”(Burberry World Live)网站。媒体对此大加赞赏，称该店（店里手持刷卡机走来走去的销售人员取代了收银台）是这家奢侈品集团数字化革命的标志。
Burberry, which was coming off a profit warning, then saw its sales soar, and its share price nearly doubled. Apple came calling and wooed Ms Ahrendts away.
随后，原本遭遇盈利预警的博柏利出现了销售额飙升，股价几乎翻了一番。后来苹果主动找上门，将阿伦茨挖走。
Since then, the news has not been so good. Burberry has been hit hard by a fall in Chinese sales. Shares have dropped 35 per cent in the past 12 months, despite a ￡25m cost-cutting drive. The company is now considering bringing in a senior manager to shore up Christopher Bailey, who has held both the top design position and the chief executive role since Ms Ahrendts’ departure.
自那时起，形势发展一直不顺。中国区销售额下滑重创了博柏利。过去12个月，该公司股价下跌了35%，尽管推出了削减成本2500万英镑的计划。如今，博柏利正在考虑聘请一名高级经理来辅佐克里斯托弗•贝利(Christopher Bailey)，自阿伦茨离开后，贝利一直既担任创意总监、又担任首席执行官。
Burberry’s current woes may have nothing to do with Ms Ahrendts. But perhaps her highly vaunted effort to reimagine luxury shopping was more about hype than real transformation. Apple is about to find out.
博柏利当前的困境可能与阿伦茨并无关联。但或许，她在重新定义奢侈品购物体验方面被过度吹嘘的努力更多的只是炒作，而非真正的变革。苹果即将发现答案。
