Apple’s first brick-and-mortar branch in Korea is finally set to open on Jan. 27, but the long-awaited store may have kept consumers waiting just a little too long.

“I‘m happy the Apple Store is coming to Korea, for sure. But I don’t really see the point of them coming now after all these years of ignoring Korean consumers’ requests for an offline store,” said 30-year-old Choi Soo-yeon, a longtime iPhone user in Seoul.

Apple Garosugil, located in a trendy shopping district in Gangnam, comes over eight years after the first iPhone landed in Korea in November 2009. In neighboring Japan, the first Apple Store opened in 2003. The Apple Store came to China in 2008.

The reason behind Apple’s delay in bringing an offline store here may be due to the iPhone’s relatively low market share here compared to Korea’s neighbors. 

According to the latest data released by Kantar Worldpanel, as of November 2017, Apple’s market share in urban China had grown to almost 25 percent, while in Japan, iPhones have crossed the 50 percent threshold. 

In Korea, industry estimates put the iPhone’s market share at about 20 percent, trailing behind handsets from homegrown powerhouses Samsung and LG.

Apple consumers have long been demanding an offline store here, citing difficulties in finding licensed engineers to help with troubleshooting.

Once Apple Garosugil opens next week, users will be able to visit the store, not only to buy handsets and data plans, but also to receive troubleshooting support and to attend workshops on using Apple products, according to the company’s website.

Industry watchers also speculate that having an offline base for glitzy launches may nudge Korea onto lists of first-release countries for new models of the iPhone. Until now, Korean consumers have had to buy new models abroad if they did not want to wait for the official Korean launch through third-party sellers.

“To be honest, we have not seen iPhone sales affected much by recent bad publicity. IPhone users are pretty loyal,” said an official with a wireless carrier here, referring to controversy surrounding an iOS update that slowed down operations of older iPhones. 

“The first store here may be Apple’s way of trying to kick-start defections away from Samsung and LG, beyond its core base of users.”

It is yet uncertain whether that strategy will work. 

The first Apple Store comes at a sensitive time, with the first civil suit against Apple and Apple Korea being filed this month asking for compensation for iPhone users claiming damages from iPhone’s software update that slowed down apps to fix battery problems in older iPhones.

Apple did not respond to a request for comment in time for this article. 

By Won Ho-jung (hjwon@heraldcorp.com)