Ungenius

or: Working the Genius Bar in Dell Country

One of the Genius Bars I worked was smack dab in the middle of Dell Country. For those not up on such things, Dell’s worldwide corporate HQ is in Round Rock, Texas, a suburb/nearby rival of the state capital, Austin. Austin is a high-tech city if there ever was one. Drivers down US183, Mo-Pac, or Capital of Texas Highway will be greeted by signage for corporate campuses small and large for IBM, Sun, AMD, Intel, Samsung, Motorola Freescale, and many others including our favorite fruit-inspired iPod maker. Apple is represented in Austin by a major corporate campus as well as an AppleStore on the opposite end of town, at Barton Creek Square Mall.

Dell in Austin

Dell is ever-present in Austin, and sometimes it feels like everyone you know works for one of three entities: the State Government, the University of Texas, or Dell. Most of Dell’s employees (well, most of the employees I knew, at least) seemed to be contractors, and a tremendous number of employees floated back and forth between Apple and Dell over time as their contract with each expires. Even so, most employees stick with one company or the other. They all have one thing in common, though.

They love Apple products.

No kidding. Not a day went by that I didn’t help someone with their iMac, PowerBook, or iPod, who wasn’t wearing a Dell staffer polo or Dell security badge. Many of the Dell-employed iPod owners didn’t even seem to know that their company made a competing product. They didn’t even care, when asked about it. To them, the market was owned by the iPod, and that’s what they wanted to be seen with, what they wanted to give their kids or significant others.

I asked one Dell QA Engineer, toting a PowerBook into the Bar for a quick software session, about this. He told me that he dealt with qualifying and testing security releases, and he didn’t feel like living through that experience as both an employee and as a customer. It almost sounded like, “I know how crappy we treat our customers. Why would I subject myself to that?”

Dell’s Case of Corporate Envy

Michael Dell is pretty vocal about his feelings about Apple. It’s pretty clear Apple’s under his skin. On one hand, when asked how Apple affects his business, he tries to minimize his exposure by talking about how Apple’s a bit player, how Apple can’t keep this up forever. On the other hand, he can’t seem to shut up about Apple. One quote very nearly has both aspects neatly tucked into it, though you have to consider the bigger picture to see it.

Apple certainly has done a very nice job with their products. I think you’re going to see a number of new, competitive dynamics in that market …music services. We’ve been working with MTV, which has a new service called Urge. That’s an exciting space that Apple has done well in, but I would be surprised if they are able to maintain the share they have today over the next ten or 20 years. In terms of competition with Apple (in PCs), our share numbers speak for themselves. Apple is growing, but is still not in the top five in share for computers. Michael Dell, quoted in Michael Dell’s Swipe At Apple A Glancing Blow?

If you think about it a bit, Apple’s been pretty up-front that the iTunes Music Store is not, itself, a profit center for the company. It is merely a sales vehicle for the iPod. The two form a symbiotic pair, jointly benefiting Apple quite nicely. The iTMS could not be without the success of the iPod preceding it, and the continued success of the iPod could not be without the iTMS supplementing it. The point is that the music store didn’t make the iPod, but instead fostered further growth. Dell doesn’t have the same rousing success in it’s DJ that a music store will come along and make better. Yet here they come, mimicking Apple once again.

I can’t help but imagine Michael Dell walking down the halls of Dell, getting more and more furious as employees pass by with distinctive white wires dangling from their ears. Tired of seeing his employees wearing Apple gear, he pushes hard for the release of a Dell rip off. When the rip off doesn’t take off, he gets more and more furious when his own employees continue to buy the Apple gear, forsaking their own. Grasping at straws, he seizes upon the music store, hoping it’ll draw the customers that the device itself could not.

I wonder if he can even go jogging without frothing at the mouth, now that I think about it…