Mar 15
A Japanese Apple Store employee sent a note to Digg founder Kevin Rose detailing his company’s rather impressive response to last week’s massive earthquake, beginning with the quake itself, when the store’s staff “staff calmly led people from the top 5 floors down to the first floor, and under the ridiculously strong wooden tables that hold up the display computers.”
The store remained open during the numerous aftershocks, according to the employee, giving panicked residents access to computers to get the latest news and communicate with loved ones via e-mail, Twitter, and Facebook. The store also serves as one of the few free Wi-Fi hotspots in the area, letting people send and receive updates through mobile devices.
The staff provided extra extension cords for people to use their devices, eventually closing at 10PM, to allow the staff to go home. After close, a number of folks reportedly camped out in front of the store to take advantage of the Wi-Fi.
A follow up note from the anonymous employee is even more impressive. The store’s senior managers were instructed to stock up on food and water after the first quake. The stores let Apple employees (both retail and corporate) sleep in the stores along with their families.
The company’s head of international HR spent the night in the store and told employees that Apple would handle travel, food, hotel, and other expenses if they attempted to make the trip home.
In all, it reads like a bit of a love letter to the company (including the insistence that FaceTime was far more reliable than Skype during the emergency)–but in this case, a little fanboyism seems warranted.
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