Thanks, Apple!

An electronics brand manufactures your rather expensive laptop with a defective component which fails 3 years after purchase. Not long after, the same brand announces that the MP3 player you bought 6 years ago has a potentially faulty battery. If that were the end of the story, I imagine you would never buy a product from this company again. I would imagine there would be wholesale defections of consumers, possibly permanently, to other brands.

Well, the brand in this case is Apple. And in this case, far from moving my allegiance, I think I will probably be hanging around for a few more years yet.

About 1 month ago, my MacBook Pro started acting funny. Strange lines appeared across my screen, the computer seemed unusually hot, and eventually all that would appear would be a fault message in 6 different languages. I took my laptop to the Apple store in Shibuya and a week later I was told it was ready for collection - no charge! The logic board which forms the majority of the internal gadgetry required replacement due to a manufacturing error. I am now the proud owner of a MacBook Pro which has had most of the internal components replaced. Had I have had to pay for this myself, the bill would have been approximately £350. It is not unreasonable to now expect my laptop to carry on going untroubled for a few more years yet.

Last night, I received an email about my long forgotten iPod Nano which was been gathering dust for the majority of the last 6 years. The mail informed me that there is a potential problem with the battery which therefore requires some form of remedy.

Dear iPod nano owner, Apple has determined that, in very rare cases, the battery in the iPod nano (1st generation) may overheat and pose a safety risk. Affected iPod nanos were sold between September 2005 and December 2006. This issue has been traced to a single battery supplier that produced batteries with a manufacturing defect. While the possibility of an incident is rare, the likelihood increases as the battery ages.

Apple recommends that you stop using your iPod nano (1st gen) and follow the process noted below to order a replacement unit, free of charge.

After following the additional instructions on the email, it turns out that my iPod Nano is from one of the manufacturing batches which require replacement. The official line from Apple is that this would be a like for like replacement i.e. 1st generation iPod for 1st generation iPod. However, according to other sources such as The Guardian Newspaper, the replacement will come in the form of the latest 6th generation iPod Nano. Perfect! Can you guess what one of Clara's Christmas requests was? Yep, an iPod Nano.

So, all in all, despite the problems with some of the Apple hardware I have bought over the years, it would seem that I am now an even more loyal customer. In admitting their errors and providing replacements with little stress or effort, they have ensured that my hard earned cash will flow in their direction for some years yet.

This experience reminds me of the Tylenol saga from 1982 - product problems which were dealt with openly and without too much focus on the bottom line. The result? A greater market share and a brand with an even stronger market reputation.