Comet cuts jobs as sales fall

Kesa Electrical – the owner of Comet – said today it is shutting distribution centres and laying off 150 staff after a quarter of falling sales. Kesa said the quarter ended 30 April 2011 saw Comet's like-for-like sales fall 15.2 per cent. Excluding a government-sponsored multi-media initiative which started in the fourth …

[It wasnt me]

Competition

Competition is a great leveller of the playing field. Its a very, very simply business rule that the likes of Comet / DSG still dont understand. Unless you compete you will die. Whilst you are still trying to sell USB / Network / HDMI cables for £20 you are not competing.

It is also a great insult to the now internet savvy customers that they think they can get away with it.

Its a shame really, I would like some of these stores to survive. But every time I enter one and see the prices of commodities I end up wishing them nothing but failure. A shame for the employees, and a shame that corporate greed seems to over-ridden such a basic premise of doing business.

[Alastair Dodd 1]

Maybe they would sell more

if their staff had any actual knowledge about what they sell, last time i went in there they were utterly useless and didn't even know what any of the information on the labels for the items was.

Out of date and no clue.

[Simon 6]

They go beyond over-charging!

I had a graphics card die and went around the local tin-pot stores but all were out of the one I was after. They are ALL charging between £45-£65 for the card. I was desperate and went to Comet where I was charged £130 for the same card.

That was the last time I went to Comet...

[HP Cynic]

Comet/Currys/PC World etc have long been a joke

It's not just that the staff are infamously useless but would often tell bold-faced lies to get a sale.

To me these shops have been anachronisms for a decade or more, it's only the stupidity and gullibility of the general public that's kept them going this long!

[Anonymous Coward]

some reasons

1) what they other guys on the forum said, including overpricing, consumer information via web, poor staff training.

2) devaluation of pound relative to purchase cost of far-east electronics

3) more favourable contract terms online (including 7 day returns under DSRs)

4) george fucking osborne telling us we're all broke

5) difficulty of consumers getting credit for purchases

[Anonymous Coward]

What?!?!

Not flogging enough iPad2's to keep opinionated and ill-informed spotty dweebs in minimum wage employment?

Shocking.

[Anonymous Coward]

Out come the we hate retail mob

Firstly I work for Comet's competitor Dixons Retail (Annon because of this) and my thoughts are with the staff who will be losing their jobs thanks to this announcement.

I'm sure there will be much glee about this at my work over the next few days. Something I do not feel and will not join in with.

The other thing is the majority of people here are tech savy and know what they want / need, if you think Comet / Currys / PCW etc are expensive - go somewhere else. There's no need to call staff utterly useless and the companies rip off merchants.

Comet and Currys etc cater to a totally different market from readers here, I don't buy most of my kit from work, even with the employee discount it's cheaper to buy online. However if you don't know what you are doing there are some real advantages of going to a retail store even if you pay more.

Also I think that retail stores are working very hard to shake off the "hard sell" image of electronic retail, sure they still sell extended warranties and "over priced" extras but the core products aren't that badly priced when you consider the extra cost of bricks and mortar stores and I can certainly vouch for the staff were I work in regards to knowledge. Sure they sell everything from Cookers to Printers but there's always someone who knows what they're talking about that you can go to to get the right information for the specific product.

I personally think for the RIGHT person, an extended warranty can be worth the money. I certainly recommended my Grandparents take Dixon's extended warranty on their laptop as they stay 300 miles away from me and even GoToAssist/TeamViewer etc can't fix all problems.

Just remember when you are complaining about these stores you are complaining about people's livelihood. Quite often the negative reactions I see on tech boards are the same ones I used to have until I realised I have avoided these stores for years, and therefore had an outdated image of the service, and was definitely NOT the target market. Also remember that these companies have 100s of stores so it is very difficult to gauge an accurate representation of the company as a whole as opposed to the service in one store along with the fact people tend only to speak up when they feel they have been wronged as opposed to receiving good customer service.

It would be nice for every retail employee to be know every single thing about every single product in store, for retailers to be cheaper than online and give away free puppies and ice cream but then it'd be nice to win the lottery and have a "thing" with Charlize Theron, unfortunately I think the latter is more likely than the former.

Certainly I don't really want to work for Dixons Retail but I get paid a couple of quid above minimum, don't have to work in management and don't have to use hard sell on anyone so I can't currently complain too much.

[TA1]

some info...

I used to work for a high street retailer and one thing I always used to say is that you have to mix good products with knowlegable sales staff because one of the main reasons that people chose to visit stores is to actually see their productss/wares in person (try before you buy). In defence of the high street though, there is more overhead cost compared to an internet-only outfit. I think that these guys need to think about this in order to survive.... It may not be too late!