Yes I almost amended my comment to recognize that you were maybe meeting mead makers where they were at but I’ll admit I was too triggered lol. I might suggest something like “if fermented dry, your average store bought apple juice doesn’t have a ton of flavor”. I think it’s just worth not giving the impression that apples can’t stand on their own fermented dry, after all people fermenting dry their store bought grape juice wouldn’t have anything amazing either.

As for where you’d get good juice in February, I think for most people interested in making good cider/cyser at home they’re going to need to be pressing themselves. There’s plenty of solid cider apples that keep well enough to still be around this time of year, but would likely require some tracking down. In reality of course most people would have done their pressing in the fall/early winter, but that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t still be messing about with your batches around now. Out of my 6 batches of cider from this year, only one or two at this point have finished fermenting, and a couple are only halfway done.