Yesterday, The New York Times ran an article entitled The mysterious case of Apple and the elusive Angela Ahrendts which, in a nutshell, made the case that Apple’s Senior VP, Retail and Online Stores, Angela Ahrendts, was missing from public view.

At the heart of the Times’ article was this quote:

“Instead, it is Jonathan Ive, chief design officer of Apple, who has become the face of the brand.”

As part of the followup to our post of the Times’ article, I received this direct response to that quote, in an email from someone who works on the retail side:

Not to us Apple Retail employees! I don’t remember the last time I saw a photo of Tim Cook on any internal communications, but Angela? We start every week with her latest video. Hell, we see her so often that after she got her hair done a few weeks ago, employees noticed.

To me, this quote speaks volumes, both about Angela’s location (head down, hard at work improving the Apple Store experience) and about the loyalty that she engenders in the people who work in Apple’s retail operations.

Just an anecdote, but one I thought was worth sharing.