Like pretty much all other (popular) mobile devices in the US, the vast majority of iPhones are sold through carriers, distantly followed by their manufacturers’ online and offline shops and then Best Buy and “other” channels.
What’s perhaps even more surprising about CIRP’s new research are the iPad and Mac sales numbers generated by the US Apple Store. While that is in fact the main retail channel for both product families, its share of sales across the nation is nowhere near as impressive as you may have thought.
We’re talking just 29 percent for iPads and 39 percent for Macs, with Amazon holding a large 23 percent slice of the former pie and Best Buy responsible for 26 percent of the latter category.
Of course, retailers (and carriers) need Apple’s business just as much, which explains, for instance, why Amazon is keeping iPads around on its e-commerce platform to compete against its in-house Fire tablets.
