Apple Camp, But Not a Sleepover

| July 19, 2006, 02:33 PM

This morning, my wife took my daughter to the local Apple Store at Montgomery Mall in Betheda, Md., for Apple Camp. My daughter attended a free class for iMovie.

She got to make a movie with three other kids (the class had a dozen total) and she left with bunch of freebees (e.g., Apple Camp swag): Certificate, T-Shirt, Field Journal (e.g., notebook), Field Guide and cloth Apple Camp patch. For the parents that had to hang around for the two-and-a-half hour class, the Apple Store provided complimentary iPods (not to take home, of course, but for in-store listening).

I do know the stores have offered the classes for a few summers, but I don't know what these classes cost Apple to run. Whatever the cost, the end payout has got to be greater. My daughter is suddenly quite excited about iMovie and all the swag has generated good feelings about Apple.

I think other high-tech companies with retail operations, like Dell or Sony, should take a long, hard look at what Apple is doing with these summer educational camps. There are good reasons why McDonalds offers Happy Meals. They create good memories for kids and positive association with the restaurant--and then there are the parents, which are likely to positively respond about anything that benefits their kids (or appears to).

If you want to reach the parents, the kids are a good way about it. Kids are purchase influencers, too, as colleague David Card (he heads up JupiterResearch teen research) can better explain than I. Additionally, Apple Camp exposes the products and the Apple brand to consumers when they're young (and presumably more impressionable).