Apple is reportedly planning at least 15 new retail stores in the Asia-Pacific market, as well as five more outlets in Europe and the Middle East, and four additional locations in North America. Initial reports indicate the expansion is expected to run through 2027 and will also include refurbishing or relocating existing stores in the U.S., Europe and Asia. Overall, the company is exploring 53 new, remodeled or relocated stores over the next four years. Revitalization of the 22-year-old retail operation arrives in the wake of Apple contending with the COVID-19 pandemic downturn and labor unrest at some of its locations.

“The idea is to build Apple’s brand in growth markets, such as India, while also giving consumers in the U.S. and Europe a better experience,” Bloomberg writes. Among the notable locations under discussion are the company’s first store in Malaysia and a site at London’s Battersea Power Station, near the new UK headquarters.

Apple is also “planning an additional location in Miami, and there’s a flagship store slated for the Jing’an Temple Plaza in Shanghai,” according to Bloomberg, which says “an upgrade to Apple’s historic location in the Opera shopping area of Paris” is also under consideration.

India is a big focus, with the possibility of three new stores there. Apple Insider reports that while Apple does not, as a rule, share sales figures for individual retail outlets, “two industry executives revealed that the new Apple stores in India have achieved record-breaking monthly sales — exceeding other retailers in the country.”

In April, Apple opened its first two India stores, with each racking up sales of between $2-3 million, according to Apple Insider, which says the figures are “more than twice the highest revenue that an electronics store in the country typically achieves outside the Diwali festival period.”

Bloomberg includes the caveat that “some of the future locations and their timing remain either internal projections or proposals, meaning they could either be delayed or canceled altogether,” but notes that some of the stores “are already in development, with Apple having agreed to leases with landowners.”

Apple currently has retail operations in 26 countries, in excess of 520 stores, about half of them in the U.S. “The chain is famously lucrative on a square-footage basis, but the stores are often more about building Apple’s brand than selling goods,” Bloomberg writes, adding that “the company gets most of its revenue from other channels, including its e-commerce site.”

Related:
Apple Touts $1.1 Trillion in App Store Commerce in 2022, TechCrunch, 5/31/23