Ron Johnson was the first head of retail at Apple and is the man responsible for making Apple Stores the kind of place that you actually want to visit. While he failed to do the same thing as the CEO of JCPenny, he still has an impressive enough reputation that we believe him when he says his new firm, known as Enjoy, will essentially be a part-time worker’s paradise.
As Apple’s first head of retail, Ron Johnson built an empire by designing stores people would actually want to visit, focusing on customer service at almost any cost, and building a high-quality workforce. He then failed to recreate the same sort of magic as CEO of JCPenney, the US department store chain. But now Johnson is back with another spin on retail. Johnson’s new firm, Enjoy—which launched this month in San Francisco and New York—combines e-commerce, customer service, training, and support. Customers can buy a curated selection of gadgets like drones or wireless speakers directly or from a partner site, and then choose when an Enjoy “expert” will deliver it to their home, office, café, or wherever, and teach them how to use it for an hour. But what’s just as interesting is how Johnson intends to build this company: employing a fleet of part-time workers that can pick their own hours, à la Uber, but have the stability and benefits of a full-time, salaried position.
