Apple Store ... Holyoke ???
(click on images for larger version)
While pushing my son around the Ingleside Mall in Holyoke, MA a couple months ago I glanced up from my trance of making sure his stroller did not run into anyone to see the black wall with the gray logo symbolic of an Apple Store being installed. I was honestly shocked and amazed to see this. The Ingleside is undergoing a much needed revival but it is still quite dated looking in large areas and has some pretty depressing stores, such as the bleak pet store which carries puppies and kittens despite the giant PETCO down the road, and the food court that needs to be flooded with Goo Gone. Things started to make a little more sense when I looked around to see a Starbucks going in down the way, opening a couple weeks before the Apple store, it must be a conspiracy, or definitely some sort of deal. (Check out the comment on this image of the Ginza store for more evidence of Apple and Starbucks in cahoots)
The closest Apple Store to me right now is 1hr 20 minutes away at a mall in Connecticut I rarely go to, my first pick if I had to go to an Apple Store would be Cambridge, MA because I can always use an excuse to go back to the place I called home for 10 years. The Apple Store in Holyoke will be a mere 40 minutes away along a route I regularly travel, better.
I don't even know why I am sort of happy to see it go in, a sign of progress perhaps, property values going up, the once depressing mall becoming more useful at a steady pace. Honestly, Apple probably could have bargained to get the whole city of Holyoke to clean up a bit before they put the store in.
I brought my camera today and stitched together the Starbucks/Apple cabal, despite having an insanely good coffee place nearby I probably will visit Starbucks and the Apple Store while killing time.
The dowside, or perhaps upside I suspect is that the small local Apple resellers will probably get crushed by the new store. I'm not sure if this is a bad thing as the last and only time I went to a local reseller was to check it out and get a spare battery for my MBP. I waited far too long for the cashier to stop chit chatting with a non-customer, they couldn't find the part number (despite the machine having been out over 6 months) and never ever called me back about it even though I placed an order for it on paper. So, screw them, welcome Apple Store.
4 Comments:
Chris,
You paint Holyoke Mall to be a dead, dated mall which it is not. If fucking Cambridge is so much better, then why don't you move back so you can go to Chesnut Hill Mall everyday. You're another condecending import snob, just tolerating us hicks while you honor us with your witless observations. Only Cambridge and West Farms deserve Apple stores. And, by the way, Starbucks coffee sucks, it's over-roasted.
Ken Richards
Holyoke Mall is owned by Pyramid Management Group (http://www.pyramidmg.com), a Syracuse, New York based company which operates primarily in New York state. The common areas in both the Holyoke Mall and the Hampshire Mall, another Pyramid property, are very dated and you would be kidding yourself to think otherwise.
One would expect that with all these new higher end tenants extracting money from the locals, Pyramid could put a little effort into the common areas. Perhaps the locals don't really care, and will even defend the outdated mall! Meanwhile some people who don't live here can keep making money off of you.
Even though I'm not a big Starbucks fan, I gotta say I was very very happy to see both Starbucks and Apple opening up in Holyoke.
Holyoke Mall is very dated, like Hampshire Mall, they are both relics. Unlike Holyoke Mall, a very alive destination since 1979, Hampshire Mall survives only because it managed to bring in some trendy big boxers a few years back.
The other half is a timewarp, it's almost unbelievable.
I've written about both (and photographed them extensively) on my mall-related, retail site.
Anyway, good job, you managed to avoid any security confrontations. Holyoke Mall does NOT take kindly to cameras in their mall (got yelled at here once and security runs this place like a military installation).
Not a Starbucks drinker (I'm a DD guy) but I'm glad they totaled that dying cow of a chain, Nancy's for it. Their coffee was horrible.
Nicholas DiMaio
The Caldor Rainbow
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