Apple Inc. have had significant influence over other consumer electronics retailers, who have lost traffic, control and profits due to a perceived higher quality of service and products at Apple Stores. Apple's notable brand loyalty among consumers causes long lines of hundreds of people at new Apple Store openings or product releases. Due to the popularity of the brand, Apple receives a large number of job applications, many of which come from young workers. Although Apple Store employees receive above-average pay, are offered money toward education and health care, and receive product discounts, there are limited or no paths of career advancement.
History of Apple Inc. lead to Apple having over a 10% market share until 1997 when Steve Jobs was re-hired as interim CEO to replace Gil Amelio. Jobs promptly found a loophole in the licensing contracts Apple had with the clone manufacturers and terminated the Macintosh OS licensing program, ending the Macintosh clone era. The result of this action was that Macintosh computer market share quickly fell from 10% to around 3%. In 1996, the struggling NeXT company beat out Be Inc.'s BeOS in its bid to sell its operating system to Apple. Apple purchased Steve Jobs' company, NeXT on December 10, 1996, and