How useful is Minitab in the real world? I am currently a statistics student within a very good program. We use Minitab for a variety of items/classes. But, as my undergrad taught me, what you use in school isn't necessarily what is used in the real world. I'm also well-versed with C#, python and I'm learning SAS (almost ready to take the first certification test for SAS). 
Is Minitab used extensively in real world studies/jobs? Should I invest more time in learning SAS instead?
 A: Minitab's used a lot in production engineering, quality control, & Six Sigma (& when engineering companies use it in these areas, it may also have become the default statistical software in others).
Based on my experience, I reckon graduates worry too much about software (& not enough about other things, especially consulting skills); demonstrated competence in statistical programming is generally important, but lack of familiarity with any particular language/software needed for some job is easily dealt with after starting it. I would say, though, that a Minitab (or SPSS) user, rather than a SAS (or R, or Stata) user, has perhaps to take pains to show that they can do more than point & click to run canned analyses—e.g. writing macros for non-linear regression, or whatever's not in the menus at the moment.
Should you invest more time in learning SAS instead? Instead of investing more time in learning Minitab?—probably yes. Instead of investing more time in anything that gives you experience of working with real data on real problems &/or collaborating with domain experts in another field?—probably no.
A: Minitab is very popular for reliability and warranty analysis.  Used all the time in these areas, especially for litigation purposes.  I know a guy who has used Minitab since it was just a command line prompt.  What he can do with it in a short time is very impressive.
It's hard to say what to invest more time into unless you have a specific area you're interested in.  Minitab is relatively easy to pick up compared to R or SAS.
A: Google Scholar search (9/15/2014) for:
     Program      Hits
         SAS 2,610,000
SPSS or PSPP 1,640,000
       Stata 1,280,000
  Statistica   459,000
         JMP   249,000
  R and cran    86,500
     Minitab    85,800
      Systat    73,800
        BMDP    45,900
      SUDAAN    17,100

That said: there's lots of reasons besides popularity to choose a platform:


*

*performance for specific data set sizes

*cost

*extensibility

*how fast new techniques are released/old techniques are updated

*documentation and support

*perpetual versus rental license

*what your team uses

*portability

*multi-core support

*multi-user support

*the nature of the errors in the software or documentation

*does it do specifically what you need it to do

*interface

*&c.

A: Rexer Analytics does a tool survey every year that you can obtain by e-mailing them. This is not the best data in the world, but Minitab is pretty far down the list, though its users do seem to like it. The rarely-seen-in-the-wild characterization is consistent with the better Muenchen data from job postings and related sources (including the Rexer data), and my own experience in industry research.
Based on the above data, I would spend your time learning R, unless there are some industry-specific reasons to focus on SAS. I write this as a heavy and happy Stata user that has never had an employer balk at purchasing a license. An added complication is that most people around you will use Excel for just about everything and you should learn a tool that plays nice with it, as well as being able to query SQL databases.
