Apple iPhone Day One: Ritual, Rage and EMI

On 18 September.2026, the iPhone 18 was launched world over in multiple variants and colours. In select global markets, Apple’s first foldable iPhone model, termed the Duo was also launched, with only pre-orders available in the Indian market. 

Apple Watch Series 12 and the Ultra 4, along with Airpods 5 were also launched. 

Tim Cook, outgoing CEO of Apple shared a post on X (formerly Twitter) terming the event as “Happy Availability Day”. Part humour, part jubilation. 

Back in India, there is a video doing the rounds. A man stood outside a store for over ten hours.  When cameras caught up with him, he admitted — cheerfully — that he had no idea what the iPhone 18 Pro's key features were.

He just wanted to be first. That, right there, is the story of modern consumer desire in an unrehearsed exchange.

Buying an iPhone on Day One is no longer about the handset. 

It hasn't been for a while now. Social currency. Hysteria. A near-sacred annual ritual for a growing tribe. The purchase is almost incidental. The act of possession is everything. 

Let me profile who they are, because it gets genuinely interesting for anyone watching the sector.

At the top of the pyramid sits the elite tier — corporate boardroom executives, business owners, and children of wealthy families. 

They walk in during the opening three days. Quietly. No queues, no spotlight.  

The iPhone is an extension of who they are, not a celebration of it.

Then comes the aficionado — the dedicated Apple loyalist. They have been tracking the regular release schedule for months, studied every teardown, watched each hands-on review. 

They show up at launch because they actually want what is new. They are fewer in number than we think.

The largest and truly fascinating segment, however, is the EMI buyer. Young Millennials earning up to INR 12 lakhs a year.

Content creators — in front of and behind the camera. People whose entire digital life runs through a single screen because they own neither a laptop nor a tablet. 

For them, the iPhone is not a device. It is identity. 

Banks have grasped this beautifully — structured EMIs keep monthly outflows around INR 4,000, making perpetual renewals feel painless. 

Buy, pay, upgrade, repeat. The loop never breaks, and nobody is complaining.

And then there is colour — Apple's greatly underrated weapon. 

Under Steve Jobs, the palette was binary: black or white. 

Tim Cook steadily expanded it — Slate, Space Grey, Gold with the iPhone 5S in 2013, succeeded by the iconic Product Red. Today, 

Apple's range reads like a Holi poster — deliberate, festive, deeply aspirational. The iPhone 17 Pro's Orange turned into a peer contagion — one person posted, ten followed. 

The iPhone 18 Pro's Burgundy is more considered — a quiet declaration. When you carry any of these rare finishes, you announce your arrival before you say a word.

The celebrity layer adds its own dimension.  

Film stars sharing unboxing reels on Instagram are not being spontaneous — they are reinforcing the fantasy for millions of followers.  

The iPhone 18 Pro is already all over feeds before the majority have even laid hands on it.

Here is what retail teaches you: what is seen is what is perceived. 

Nobody knows which AirPods you are wearing. But everyone notices which iPhone you are holding — and increasingly, which shade. 

That is the difference between a product and a symbol. Apple has been selling the latter for a very long time now.

The Day Average Joe walked into Harvard

Thirty years ago, I left school barely able to hold a conversation in English. Writing was a distant dream — a country I had no visa for.

My parents, bless them, believed in me more than I ever did in myself. They pledged gold to send me to NIIT every morning from 7am to 9am. I would then take the bus to RKM Vivekananda College, Chennai for my B.Com every evening from 4pm to 8pm. In between, from 11am to 3pm, six days a week, I scooped ice cream at Baskin Robbins — their second outlet in India, right near my home.

Eighteen months of DOS, C, C++, Java, and MS Access. Long lab sessions staring at what I called a "smart-box." I scored in the top percentile. And then I prostrated before my parents and said — “I have no plans to save the world from Y2K”.

They pledged their newly bought house next. For my MBA. No parent should ever have to do that. No son should ever forget it, I say.

Campus placement at RPG Retail followed — a decent salary at the turn of the millennium, when jobs were genuinely hard to find. 

What came next felt like a long relay race across fourteen extraordinary years — Musicworld, Foodworld, Central Malls by the Future Group, United Colors of Benetton, Cafe Coffee Day, and Royal Enfield. 

Each baton pass shaped me more than I understood at the time.

Twenty years ago, I became the first Indian to pioneer Airport Retail — at the country's first PPP greenfield airport in Bangalore. That single chapter handed me a confidence I had never owned before, and a reputation that quietly preceded me across the Indian retail industry.

Fifteen years of Strategy Advisory and Consulting later, something stirred. In August 2024, I began exploring the Senior Executive Leadership Program at Harvard Business School. I enrolled in December 2025. A fat tuition fee. Full-on debt.

My maiden trip to Boston was equal parts surreal and stunning. 

Standing in the rain outside the Mumbai Consulate in mid-July. A 90-second visa interview. Four tense minutes at Boston Logan — answering a curious officer's questions while he read my HBS invitation letter with what felt like deliberate slowness.

And then — the campus. The Baker Library. One hundred and fifty case studies across nine months, led by eighteen of the world's finest teachers, professors, and human beings.

My opinions mattered in that classroom. They rarely shifted. But my lens changed — permanently.

In the closing session, I told our Dean: "I came here in January 2026 hungry and impatient. I am leaving as a human being — taught humility, and to live with Purpose."

On 11 September 2026, forty-eight rockstars of the 22nd SELP-India batch stood outside Baker Hall together. I felt equal, grateful, and ready.

Average Joe. Done well, I say.

I still have Miles To Go.

Boston Days — Part 18

Two Airports, One Telling Silence

(I am writing "Boston Days" as a series of articles for quick reference for myself and other retail pilgrims. This concluding piece is about two airports — and what retail looks like inside each.)

August 22. Madras Day. The 387th anniversary of the founding of one of India's greatest cities. I was at Chennai International Airport, bags checked, about to board a flight to Boston.

There was not a single mention of it anywhere. Not a standee. Not a display. Not a book.

That absence travelled with me. It returned sharply weeks later at Boston Logan — on Labor Day weekend. A city that helped ignite American independence, now 250 years past. 

Not a word of acknowledgement. Not a commemorative shelf. No bookstore at either airport. For two cities carrying centuries of documented history and global significance, that is a remarkable omission.

Both airports are government-operated. Both have made credible choices in their retail concessionaires. 

At Chennai, the spread is genuinely varied — Chennai Duty Free by Flemingo anchors international departures with perfumes, chocolates, spirits and Gifts from India. 

Adyar Ananda Bhavan draws steady queues. Barista offers a comfortable sit-down space. 

The specialty corridor carries Fabindia, Forest Essentials, Nappa Dori, Hidesign, Co-optex and Krishna Pearls — a grounded, India-rooted selection. 

Guardian Pharmacy and Ray-Ban round off a reasonable concession mix. Newcomer Vidveda is still behind hoarding, clearly getting ready. 

Boston Logan reads differently — Boston Duty Free runs a strong liquor, wine and tobacco operation across terminals. 

Color Pop brings a curated beauty offer. Stephanie's delivers comfort food and cocktails to a reliably packed house. Gachi holds its own in sushi and noodles.

Each airport has its anchors. Neither is truly driving conspicuous consumption.

The problem is structural. At both locations, stores occupy the sides of the walking corridor — the passenger is not required to pass through retail to reach the gate. 

At Singapore, Hong Kong and Dubai, retail is the pathway. Stores have no shutters. SKUs reach almost into the aisle. The distance between traveller and product collapses by design. Here, you must choose to walk in. Most passengers simply do not.

The lounge picture compounded things further. At Chennai, the Priority Pass lounge sits on the third floor — a deliberate detour that breaks the departure rhythm. 

At Boston Logan, no independent Priority Pass lounge exists at all. Only airline-specific clubs, behind closed doors.

Why do government-run airports worldwide maintain this quiet, hands-off relationship with consumerism — even when the infrastructure is entirely capable?

Passenger amenities, to their credit, are well managed at both. Clean, functional, adequately staffed.

But the business of retail — the invitation to browse, to discover, to spend — is still waiting for its boarding call.

Boston was teaching me on last time, as I bid adieu to the States. Until we meet again, IF we meet again, perhaps! 

(I am writing "Boston Days" as a series of articles for quick reference for myself and other retail pilgrims. This is the concluding piece in the series.)

Read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13, Part 14, Part 15, Part 16 and Part 17 here.

Boston Days — Part 17

The Name Promised The World. The Store Delivered A Bazaar.

(I am writing "Boston Days" as a series of articles for quick reference for myself and other retail pilgrims. This article covers what a visit to one of America's most ambitiously named specialty retailers revealed about category identity, the discovery model, and why a brand name without a brand spine is just signage.)

There is something about a name.

World Market. Two words. Infinite expectation. I stood outside — beige façade, red serif lettering — and felt the particular excitement only a retail pilgrim truly understands.

In the late 1950s, a San Francisco businessman began selling shiploads of hand-woven wicker from one of the city's piers. 

William Amthor opened the first store in 1958 at Fisherman's Wharf and called it Cost Plus World Market — named after his pricing strategy of selling goods at cost plus ten percent. 

The model was essentially a bazaar: imported furniture, eclectic finds, a treasure hunt by design. 

Bed Bath & Beyond acquired the chain in 2012 for USD 495 million. Los Angeles-based private equity firm Kingswood Capital Management completed its acquisition in 2021, retaining approximately 245 stores. Today the brand simply calls itself World Market.

A few quick facts the curious retail practitioner should know. 

Typical store size runs between 16,000 and 20,000 square feet. California leads with 52 stores; Florida follows with 28. There is no international footprint — this is an entirely US-domestic chain. 

The original Fisherman's Wharf store closed in 2020. The nearest competitors are HomeGoods and TJ Maxx — interestingly, World Market's own Executive Chairman Alex Smith previously served as Group President of HomeGoods at TJX — along with IKEA for furniture, ethnic grocery chains for the food section, and the now-bankrupt Pier 1 Imports, which was, ironically, a direct Cost Plus franchise spin-off from the 1960s. 

The core consumer profile is middle-income, college-educated, culturally curious, and homeownership-oriented — a shopper who takes pride in an eclectic, well-travelled aesthetic on a sensible budget.

I walked in, expecting discovery. What I found was a potpourri.

Greeting cards — an entire wall. Then loose furniture. A Little Italy pasta aisle. A Bake Shop corner with Cadbury and Pascal. Keogh's crisps beside Dad's Root Beer. 

Henna wood elephants from Rajasthan under the Craft by World Market sub-brand. Impulse candy at checkout.

Three decisive observations for the retail practitioner.

One: The discovery model is not dead — but it demands curation. TJ Maxx thrives on treasure-hunt retail. The difference is that TJ Maxx has a consistent identity: great brands, below-market price, across one broad lifestyle category. World Market has the treasure hunt without the theme. Browsing without a compass is not discovery. It is exhaustion.

Two: Amazon has not killed discovery retail — it has raised its bar. You can find Bundaberg Root Beer, Keogh's crisps, and imported pasta cheaper on Amazon, delivered faster. The only reason to walk into a physical import store is for serendipity that feels intentional. World Market's serendipity currently feels accidental.

Three: A name is a contract with the consumer. World Market implies curation, provenance, a point of view. What the store delivers is an assortment strategy that has accumulated over decades rather than been designed. When the merchandise is everywhere and everything, it stops saying anything.

Boston was teaching me from SKUs, assortment and insights around the world.

(I am writing "Boston Days" as a series of articles for quick reference for myself and other retail pilgrims.)

Read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13, Part 14, Part 15 and Part 16 here.

Boston Days - Part 16

Fifty Dollars. Eighteen Hours. One Swedish Brand.

(I am writing "Boston Days" as a series of articles for quick reference for myself and other retail pilgrims. This article covers what a last-minute airport purchase revealed about the enormous, and largely unmade, opportunity that Travel Retail holds for brands worldwide.)

Not every retail discovery is planned. Some are born of desperation.

Over a fortnight in Boston — strenuous, stimulating, sleepless. Settled into the departure waiting area before my Emirates flight home — fourteen hours to Dubai, four more to Chennai — I reached for my Huawei earpiece. 

One of the soft ear buds of my Huawei was gone! Security checkpoint, most likely. One ear of silence is inconvenience enough for an eighteen-hour journey. I was far too tired to retrace my steps.

I walked into InMotion — the largest airport-based electronics retailer in the United States, with over 120 stores across 62 airports, owned by retail giant WHSmith. 

Apple, Bose, Sony, JBL, Beats, Sennheiser — all gleaming under focused track lighting, all projecting the confidence of brands that know their channel. 

A prominent Bose display ran a "Save USD 50" offer; even at the promoted price, nothing came under USD 130. The associate was absorbed in Reels — thumbing through short videos, fully committed to the feed. 

When I asked her which SKUs were on promotion, she glanced up with visible reluctance, pocketed her phone with some effort, and delivered a walkthrough that felt more like obligation than service. I walked out unconvinced.

The first Hudson Newsstand nearby was visibly shutting down — lights dimming, staff pulling stock, the energy of a place already closed in spirit. 

"Aren't you supposed to be open 24 hours — this being an international airport?" The young man had no real answer neither an intention to reply. Data point number two on customer service excellence. I moved on.

The second Hudson, barely a hundred metres away — two stores within a stone's throw of each other, a curiosity I am saving for another article — had a wider selection. Familiar brands under USD 50. 

And then a name I didn't recognise. Sudio. I stopped. A quick search told me enough. 

Founded in Stockholm in 2012 by engineers and music enthusiasts. Present across 16,000 stores globally — with confirmed travel retail presence in Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and at Malaysia's KLIA2 via Heinemann Asia Pacific, alongside in-flight partnerships with SAS Group. 

The A3 Pro sat at USD 50: Active Noise Cancellation, Bluetooth 5.4, IPX4 splash resistance, metallic accents in a palette that whispered rather than shouted. For a brand built by engineers with an audiophile's DNA, worth every dollar of the bet.

What also caught my eye was the Sudio Flyg — a compact Bluetooth transmitter that connects wireless earbuds directly to a seat's 3.5mm in-flight entertainment jack, including dual-jack aircraft systems. Up to twelve hours of battery. Around USD 30. Elegant, specific, and overdue.

Fifty dollars and fifteen minutes later, I was listening to music. Sudio carried me through the next eighteen hours without a complaint.

A Swedish brand. Made in China. Discovered at a major American gateway airport. By an Indian heading home. That is the full circle Travel Retail makes possible.

And yet — Sudio, I learnt, is absent from most major European hubs. 

In China, dominant local brands make meaningful entry near-impossible. In India, the brand has no official presence at all. 

I had always thought the neglect of Travel Retail was an Indian problem. That evening in Boston, I understood it is a worldwide one. The brands still leaving this channel under-served are leaving their very best introductions unmade.

Boston was once again teaching me. Thank you, Boston!

(I am writing "Boston Days" as a series of articles for quick reference for myself and other retail pilgrims.)

Read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13 and Part 14here.