John Gruber is wondering if hiring John Browett, their new head of retail, was a terrible mistake for Apple.

I was certain it was, the day his hire was announced. Why? I’d just visited London Apple Store, and Currys, an electronics retail chain I believe he managed as part of Dixons.

The difference between the experiences was stark. At the Apple Store, three employees came to ask me if they could help me in any way. The one that I had a discussion with was helpful and knowledgeable, and by problem was sorted – I got Lion on a USB stick to recover my laptop. The atmosphere of the store was also pleasant, so I strolled around and admired the architecture to the point where I had to later come in again and show the place around to my wife on a subsequent trip. Three floor high glass staircases FTW!

Now, I went to Currys to purchase a wireless travel mouse. Nobody at any point asked if they could be of assistance. One clerk was sitting bored behind the counter, two guys who looked like they might have been working there were too busy talking to each other to care about me. The mouses were spread to three separate locations in the store, making comparison between the devices super hard – they had on promotional location for Microsoft products, one location for cheap junk being offloaded from the store and then the actual shelf for mouses. On the mouse shelf, none of the price labels were positioned next to where the mouses actually were, and it seemed about a third of the devices were missing pricing information.

After deciphering the shelf puzzle for five minutes, I noticed a simple Logitech travel mouse was on a discount from ~£20 to ~$15. Great, just what I was looking for, and on sale, too! Strangely it was hidden on the floor level shelf away from the discount label, so maybe Currys didn’t want me to pick it up.

Next I go to the counter where the bored dude takes mouse and scans it. The actual price for the mouse? Around £10, one third off from the price I’d already committed to! I confirmed if that really is the price and the clerk said yes, it’s on discount. I can’t understand how any manager anywhere can think it’s a good idea to have a discount on a product without telling your customers, but that’s what Currys did. Not only were they probably losing sales due to people not knowing about the discount, but also losing profit due to undercharging the people who did purchase the mouse.

Needless to say I have no wish to return to the store unless I absolutely need something, and can’t order online, which is incredibly cheap and fast in London.

If Currys is the yardstick for what future Apple shopping experience looks like, their retail is doomed.