Microsoft: Retail Stores to Open This Fall, Some Next to Apple Stores; "Laptop Hunters" Ads Work

In February announced it was going to being opening retail stores. On Wednesday, the company announced stores would be opening in the fall, some of them next to Apple Stores.

Now that ought to be fun.

Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner told attendees at the Worldwide Partner Conference in New Orleans on Wednesday:

And stay tuned, because we're going to have some retail stores opened up that are opened up right next door to Apple stores this fall. Stay tuned, just stay tuned.

Every single thing we learn in those Microsoft stores that we put on the street we're going to share that openly and transparently with all of our retail partners so that they can do the exact same thing. And we're going to get that customer feedback directly. We're in the game for the long-term here. And I know something about retail, and we've hired and incredible team to do an incredible job on retail.

Remember that in February, also, Microsoft named David Porter as Corporate Vice President of Retail Stores; he is a former 25-year veteran Wal-Mart executive.

That's not all, however. Remember those Laptop Hunter ads? I already wrote that they were working, because for once buzz was created around a Microsoft ad campaign. Here's a story Turner told at the conference:

And you know why I know they're working? Because two weeks ago we got a call from the Apple legal department saying, hey -- this is a true story -- saying, "Hey, you need to stop running those ads, we lowered our prices." They took like $100 off or something. It was the greatest single phone call in the history that I've ever taken in business.