With Turkey President Tayyip Erdogan announcing this week that his country would boycott all US electronics in response to President Trump’s new tariffs on the region, one Silicon Valley company suddenly found itself in the Turkish crosshairs:
Apple
Angered that Trump’s trade-war rough-riding had helped bring down the Turkish lira to an all-time low, Erdogan went on the offensive.
“If they have iPhone, there is Samsung on the other side. We have Vestel Venuüs in our country,” he said, referencing a Turkish smartphone make as he spoke to members of his national conservative Justice and Development Party. “Together with our people, we will stand decisively against the dollar, forex prices, inflation and interest rates. We will protect our economic independence by being tight-knit together.”
While Erdogan’s threats could end up hurting the Turkish people more than Apple, since only 1 percent of the estimate 700 million iPhones in the world are owned by Turks, the president did successfully put his nation’s standoff with the Cupertino tech giant on the world’s center stage.
Meanwhile in Turkey’s main city of Istanbul, iPhones apparently continued to move off the shelves at the city Apple Store at Beşiktaş İstanbul, Zorlu Center, and a second store at Üsküdar İstanbul. We thought it would be interesting to take a peek at these two stores:
i visited istanbul yesterday and i did this in an apple store pic.twitter.com/JlXCFWtbFp
— emre (@emrejique) March 21, 2017
If you ever wondered what an Apple Store opening in Turkey looks like, it’s bears a remarkable resemblance to an Apple Store opening anywhere else in the world. Here’s the company’s first store in Istanbul opening in 2014:
Here’s a look at the iPhone 8 going on sale for the first time in Istanbul in late 2017:
Massive and cool Apple store in Istanbul. #lovemyjob #bleedmagenta @darinjorgensen @MaxFuchs01 @Kelli_Downard pic.twitter.com/VFcEhAKZGv
— Linda Roberts (@lindaroberts456) July 30, 2018
#Apple store Istanbul; bad customer service. Always eager to sell their great products, but in case of service always long lines -:(.
— Robert Schuddeboom (@rschuddeboom) February 21, 2016
Apple Store in istanbul looks like a Mac mini http://t.co/ADl5294Sgk pic.twitter.com/0Ew44zQzUH
— John Paczkowski (@JohnPaczkowski) March 30, 2015
Penguin protesters are dancing outside of the Apple Store @ZorluCenter in Istanbul. #freesoftware #kids #GNU #linux pic.twitter.com/W59aOBKtUi
— Nermin Canik (@nermincanik) December 13, 2014