I worked as a specialist(sales) at Apple's highest grossing retail store(5th avenue) while finishing school last winter, and you're basically correct. Apple hi

I worked as a specialist(sales) at Apple's highest grossing retail store(5th avenue) while finishing school last winter, and you're basically correct. Apple hires sales people almost entirely on the basis of attitude. The philosophy is essentially that you can teach them the basics(and telling customers you don't know and then going to find out is strongly encouraged) but its harder to teach customer service skills. There's no commission and was never any pressure to move through customers quickly. For 90% of the products apple sells, this strategy works pretty well. The exception is obviously macs, and even there 80% of your interactions require minimal knowledge. So you end up with friendly staff that's not particularly passionate about the tech specs. Which is clearly preferable the unknowledgeable and commission driven model of big box retailers, but a far cry from the small shops of the 90s. Overall it's a hard strategy to argue with. The demographics of computer users has changed dramatically since the heyday of the boutiques, and tailoring your strategy to target the enthusiast demographic tends to alienate the non tech savvy majority.