Have You Seen These?

I pass one of these almost every day on my way to school. For those of you who are utterly confused: Yes, it is an Ipod vending machine. For the longest time I couldn't figure out why these monstrosities existed. I mean, people surely don't pick a $350 Ipod as if it were a snickers bar. Who is running around making these kinds of purchases?

The thing that is really amazing is that the place where most of the machines have found a home is in airports. The logic makes sense on one level. People are prone to be bored on flights and need something to occupy their time and the Ipod can help with that. On the next level this logic crumbles; if people buy an Ipod at an airport there is no way they can charge it or get any of their songs onto it and then it is just taking up space in their carry on. I thought Apple had lost its damn mind.

Then my training as a Marketing major kicked in. Apple isn't making these machines in order to actually sell any Ipods (though I am sure that would be a welcome surprise.) Rather, Apple is trying to readjust consumer attitudes toward their product. By making us all feel like an Ipod is the same type of impulse purchase as a Milky Way the make people more likely to go out and make a high involvement purchase with little to no actual consideration. It is actually pretty brilliant. They put them in airports because (with our current airport security due to terrorism) no one will step out of line there. Essentially they keep around $5000 in machine cost and products in an airport and they have permanent and effective advertising. 

Well done, Apple.