One, i would need to drive 2 hours to get to an Apple Store, so with traffic and everything else i spend a day out of my schedule to get something fixed that i didn't break, it came broken right out of the box.
Okay, now this changes everything, in terms of what I wrote, because that's not what you said. You said Apple offered you to go to the retail store for an exchange. I certainly would drive 2 hours if the Apple retail store had one in stock for me to do an exchange. Okay, so now you're saying they wanted you to take it there to get it fixed? If so, then yeah, I would say no to that too. Please clarify which one is right? Take a look at your post number 6440.
Now, on a different note. I am one of the fortunate ones since I live within 20 minutes of 5 Apple retail stores, you're not quite as fortunate since you're 2 hours away, however there are people that wish Apple even had a store in their country and state as I mentioned this before. I can assure you, 2 hours plus traffic wouldn't a big deal for many.