In the early 1980s Steve Jobs set up a design competition to find the best candidate for Chief Industrial Design consultant at Apple. Jobs understood that great design could play a pivotal role in transforming Apple into a global brand with a unified product and corporate identity. He chose the frog design group headed by German-born Hartmut Esslinger (1944 – ), who relocated from Germany to North America to undertake the work. The Apple IIc was the first product to display all the attributes of the ‘Snow White’ design language developed by Esslinger for Apple products.

The Snow White design scheme uses horizontal and vertical stripes on enclosures to give an illusion of reduced volume to the parts; a three dimensional Apple logo inlaid into product cases; an off-white colour scheme; and the product name printed onto the surface.

Introduced alongside the new Macintosh in January 1984, it assured existing customers that the Apple II line of products would not disappear in the Macintosh revolution. The Apple IIc was an extremely popular machine, selling over 400,000 units by the end of 1984. Apple II products continued to bring in the greater portion of revenue until the early 1990s when the Macintosh overtook its predecessor.

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