Apple ship-to-store begins in San Francisco

One nice part about shopping online at Best Buy is the retailer's in-store pickup option. There's no searching the shelves for your item or waiting in a long checkout line. You order what you want online and stroll into the store a few hours later to pick it up. According to a report from 9to5Mac, Apple is now offering the same convenience of in-store pickup at its San Francisco store.

Online shoppers in the San Francisco area will see an option during checkout that'll let them select a store instead of a home address for shipping. The item will either be available the same day if they purchase a standard product normally sold in Apple stores, or in a few days if they choose a custom configuration. Customers will need an ID to pickup their product, but an earlier rumor suggests they can designate another person to do the pickup for them. This same program will supposedly have the added convenience of letting customers return online orders to the store as well.

The pilot program went live in San Francisco first and will extend to other stores in the greater Bay Area over the next week. It will eventually roll out to stores nationwide.

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One nice part about shopping online at Best Buy is the retailer's in-store pickup option. There's no searching the shelves for your...

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Mark

"There's no searching the shelves for your item or waiting in a long checkout line."

While in theory this sounds nice what has happened to me is I wind up standing in line so long (because the return line is the same as the pick up line) I could have gotten out of the store 20 minute quicker had I just pulled the item off the shelf myself.

October 26 2011 at 9:00 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Nick Powers

I personally liked when Circuit City was in business. Once you placed an order online, they had 24 minutes to prepare it for pickup for you. If it wasn't ready, you got a $24 gift card. I can't count how many times I used that to my advantage. I miss Circuit City.

October 26 2011 at 6:22 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

tnydigiaco

If you're going to the store to pick up the item on the same day then it must be in the store to begin with. So why not just go to the store. This seems to be more useful if you're buying a BTO iMac or MacPro and don't want to or can't be home to receive the the delivery (Apple always requires a signature). Just pick it up at your convenience.

October 26 2011 at 1:18 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

shippster

Many online orders were already returnable at stores - might have included all, but I am not sure about custom built orders (extra RAM, different processor, etc).

October 26 2011 at 12:58 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply