Report: 5th Avenue Apple Store sold 7,200 iPad 2s on launch
updated 11:10 pm EDT, Mon March 14, 2011
5th Ave Apple Store moves 7,200 iPad 2s on intro
About 7,200 iPad 2 tablets changed hands at the 5th Avenue Apple Store alone on launch day, a tipster said Monday night. The tally suggests that the 1,109 initial buyers were joined by thousands more within the hours after the 5PM opening. SAI didn't get buyer attach rates, though many are known to have bought two or more for friends and family.
The mix supports beliefs that Apple had very strong sales. Virtually all of Apple's 236 American retail stores sold out of their initial stock and were accompanied by AT&T, Best Buy, Verizon, Target, Walmart, and reseller stores that may have given Apple as many as 10,000 distribution points. Some of these only received a few units each, but most Apple stores received hundreds or, for flagships, thousands of iPad 2s.
Analyst predictions for the weekend's sales have varied wildly, from 400,000 to as many as one million. Apple usually prefers to celebrate the one million mark with a press release but hasn't done so yet, suggesting it may wait until a restock on Tuesday at the earliest. Disappointment at the lack of a confirming release has been tempered by a near certainty that Apple is still very likely to outdo its results from last year, when it took 28 days to reach the same figure. The 2010 results were dependent solely on US results for a completely new product where the international release is due to arrive on March 25, just two weeks after the iPad 2 became available.
Most any result Apple manages is expected to blow past Android 3.0. Motorola hasn't confirmed any figures but is estimated to be selling 300,000 Xooms for the whole quarter. The sluggish number would come from the decision to price the Xoom at $800 along with limited distribution and a lack of name recognition compared to Apple's tablet. A Wi-Fi Xoom is believed to be coming for April at a much lower $600.
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retail, industry, Verizon, AT&T, Android, Motorola, Best Buy, Target, Apple, Walmart, iPad, Xoom, iPad 2
