Has Steve Jobs become the post-boomer generation’s Walt Disney? It is beginning to look that way. Walt Disney coined the phrase “Imagineering,” which comes from the blending of the words imagination and engineering, to describe the design and development arm of The Walt Disney Company. According to the Wikipedia entry on Imagineering, “Imagineers” are renowned for their ability to blend creativity, expertise, and technological advancements.” That description may be applicable to Apple’s designers of the iPhone, the iPod, the iPad and other Apple products, which, by the way, this blog is NOT being written on.
Indeed, Apple’s “Imagineers” are attracting more visitors to Apple’s “theme parks,” namely its Apple stores, than Disney’s “Imagineers” are attracting to its theme parks. According to a chart published on theAtlantic.com on October 19, 2010, Apple’s retail stores attracted more than 74.5 million visitors last quarter alone. In all of 2009 both Disneyland and Disney World combined attracted less than 40 million visitors. As the baby boomers looked forward to watch “The Wonderful World of Disney,” post baby-boomers watch Steve Jobs’ presentations of what the “Imagineers” at Apple have come up with and then flock to see the real thing at an Apple Store theme park.
This has led Microsoft to open up brick and mortar stores in California, Arizona, Colorado, Minnesota, Seattle and Chicago. The battle between the PC and the MAC appears headed to the streets.
In the meantime, advertisers beware…Apple has filed trademark applications for THERE’S AN APP FOR THAT for, among other services, “Retail store services featuring computer software provided via the Internet and other computer and electronic communication networks; retail store services featuring computer software for use on handheld mobile digital electronic devices and other consumer electronics.” So unless one wants to suffer the same fate as Sir Issac Newton, stay away from using that phrase in your advertising.
