Bankruptcy could see RadioShack close doors for good – report Struggling electronics retailer RadioShack may not emerge from bankruptcy intact after all, sources claim. On Monday, Bloomberg reported that the cash-strapped firm may be preparing to cease all retail operations, citing anonymous sources familiar with the company's plans. Earlier reports suggested RadioShack was in talks to …
In the dying days of K-mart, its market cap went very very low. Somebody noticed that it had gone lower than the value of the leaseholds that it held. That investor apparently made a lot of money.
So what are Radio Shack's leaseholds worth?
"So what are Radio Shack's leaseholds worth?"
Presumably around $535m + 50% so far as Standard General are concerned. But I wonder who will be fighting to take up those leases? Like Europe, the US is desperately over-supplied with retail sites, and possibly SG have made a very bad bet.
No mention of the Trash-80 - the best of the first three high street micros. Commodore & Apple were more fancy design than Z80 grunt. Besides the original desktop they could claim the first A4 sized handheld that any trendy journo had to pack. Absolutely brilliant.
Trash-DOS was a bit useless which led to maybe the first free third party alternative NewDOS when Linus was still in nappies?
Ah well RIP. You will not be forgotten while I can still hit a keyboard.
RadioShack shot itself in the head many times over many years. Die already.
- Worthless minimum wage staff of know-nothings.
- That staff not bothering to care that they're know-nothings.
- Using their know-nothing skills to push utter crap on their customers.
- Crap product selection at gouge prices, even after you've avoided the know-nothings.
The result of this apparent hatred of their customers as a corporation is, as per usual, retribution and avoidance. I hate the place, and I LOVE gadgetry. If only there was a great, sane and helpful place around me for my local gadgetry needs. RadioShack hasn't been it for decades. Die already!
And some smart company replace them with something FAR better.
Agree, the suits came along and burned the place to the ground by substituting gimmicks for gadgets!
This isn't capitalism working. This is the wrecking of a classic corner store brand just so a few elite can make a killing. The Shack was a sacrificial lamb.
To the elite 1% who sucked RS dry. Enjoy your palaces in the Hampton's, your cruise ships in the Caymans, you total C*nts!!!
This isn't capitalism working. This is the wrecking of a classic corner store brand just so a few elite can make a killing. The Shack was a sacrificial lamb.
What a load of left wing bollocks. Radio Shack has/will go bust because of two reasons:
1) Consumers don't buy things in components like they used to, they buy entire gadgets.
2) People who do buy components all buy online, rather than go to a store to do so.
To the elite 1% who sucked RS dry. Enjoy your palaces in the Hampton's, your cruise ships in the Caymans, you total C*nts!!!
I know Americans don't get irony, but when you moan about the 1%, you do realise you are the 1%, right?
"I know Americans don't get irony, but when you moan about the 1%, you do realise you are the 1%, right?"
It's all perspective. Our 1% is different from yours (if you aren't in the US). And that being the case, it's all the third world to us.
Thank you for the reminder. I used to live in Willesden some time ago and have many fond memories of wandering up to Cricklewood electronics. I can't actually remember a time when they didn't have exactly what I was looking for (and a host of things that until that point I didn't know I couldn't live without).
We have seen all this before. They operated as Tandy in the UK and parts of Europe (also Australia, but I can't remember what they called themselves there), retailing grossly over-priced junk. In the Netherlands they went bust around 1992 (can't remember exact date, but I did know someone who bought lots of cheap stuff in the liquidation). In the UK they sold out to Carphone Warehouse in 1999, but later someone acquired some rights to the name and began a small-scale retail operation, tandyonline.co.uk, but I don't know how successful they are, the brand name being a real turn-off for those with past experience of the Tandy name.
Same thing in Australia, they sold out to Dick Smith, who used to retail serious electronic stuff at good prices, but have recently moved into consumerist stuff only, no components, and remain a good place to buy phones (I got one at an excellent price in my last visit, and the sales person could not have been more helpful).
So history is repeating itself, this time in the US. All businesses which are lagging way behind the competition on both cost and quality are bound to fail, eventually.
As for Maplin, they are following the same path as Tandy. Having all but killed off a large number of local electronic retailers in the 1990s, they now have only a rapidly decreasing range of good components and basic hardware, the very roots of their business in the late 1960s, and an increasing number of retail outlets stuffed full of consumerist trash, at rather uncompetitive prices. I go there only if my need is desperate and I can't wait a day or so for a delivery from any of the excellent on-line retailers like CPC or Rapid. So I predict that they will be next...
The US, like the UK, Australia (try Jameco) and probably every developed or developing nation (I know that India, for instance, has decent suppliers of components and hardware), has at least a few efficient on-line retailers. Google knows all about them, so use it! If consumers have to use on-line suppliers for their electronic supplies, they will save money, even allowing for postage costs, so I don't see the loss of Radio Shack as being detrimental in any way, provided that the staff are re-employed in the new retail operation. Losing jobs is not at all good (people matter very much), but losing a useless, inefficient, ripoff business is a very good thing indeed.
Radio Shack spun off its international operations as InterTAN, including Canada. Circuit City bought out Radio Shack Canada, but didn't get the name 'Radio Shack'. So we had 'The Source by Circuit City'. Then it got sold to Ma Bell, and turned into a boutique of mobile phone cases. Now it's dying.
As are most of the shopping malls in Canada. So the leaseholds in Canada are 80% worthless and 20% very valuable.
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Maplin is doing very nicely actually. In the black and making a profit.
Maplin did what was necessary to remain profitable.
Sure, it's not the cheapest store. But that's good business.
It has 3 different quality levels for most things. If you want super high quality it's there for a price. If you want cheap it's there as well. But if you want the cheapest, then go on the Internet, wait a few weeks and hope it's not a counterfeit. Ask your technical questions, I can answer them. Then try claiming on that 365 day guarantee your online product wouldn't have.
I see so much cheap, fake rubbish coming into our Maplin store from customers buying from Amazon or eBay.
"Maplin is doing very nicely actually. In the black and making a profit."
Depends which Maplin you mean. Maplin Electronics Ltd has seen profit before tax steadily decrease from £55m a year five years ago to £21m last year. But I'll give you that's still a profit. But what's going on with the rampant expansion into large stores and low footfall locations? And £21m on capital employed of around £273m is adequate rather than impressive is it not?
A more problematic aspect is that Maplin Electronics Group Holdings Ltd (that owns Maplin Electronics Ltd) hasn't made a profit in five years, the losses before tax have ballooned from £40m to a frankly impressive £282m loss. A cynic could conclude that either there's some world class chicanery in the accounting or that Maplin as a business isn't really making money. The demise of Radio Shack doesn't bode well, and neither does the tumbleweed strewn aisles of my local Maplin store,rather prophetically located in the building that one played host to Blockbuster.
In fairness to Maplin, unlike Tandy UK their young nerds do know their stuff. I don't need their cheerfully-proffered advice, but I hear them talking to know-nothings and it's kindly and informed. Plus they have a lot of non-displayed stuff in the basement if you ask, and can post next-day if not and if it's in their giant catalogue. Tandy started as a leather works (yes, really) and had a good run. Not their fault that components are now too tiny to solder.
I'll have you know *I* used to work for Tandy UK, and I *do* know my stuff. Mind you, this was back in the 80s when they paid a lot more than shelf-stacking at Tesco. One of my biggest sidelines was making 24V to 12V DC converters so truckers would buy the portable mini-TVs for when they were parked up (I HOPE not used when driving!). Do they still have little bunks in the cabin, I wonder?
"Tandy started as a leather works"
They used to give away free diaries which had a potted history of the company starting with its origins in the leather business. ISTR they had numerous basic tech ref pages in them, things like resistor colour codes and similar, but they also had a little chart from which, once per month, you could walk in and claim a free battery, the sales assistant crossing off that months entry.,no purchase required. Naturally, once you were in for you free battery you inevitably saw something to buy anyway :-)
I dug out a flashlight from the back of the closet which was loaded with fresh batteries in the mid-80's. I was prepared for the worst as I flipped on the switch. To my amazement, the flashlight still worked. I opened it to find 2 30yo RadioShack brand C batteries with no signs of leakage and still with some juice in them. There's something you don't see every day.
By contrast, I was stuck for a USB printer cable. RadioShack sold me a gold plated cable for $25 bucks.
There's a lot of room for improvement.
RS stopped being relevant years ago. Example: I tried to buy a basic mutimeter for my grandson. RS selection was limited and overpriced. I found a much better selection at better prices at the local Home Depot building supply warehouse, in their electrical aisle. Now a garden-variety VOM is/was about the most basic hobbyist gadget there is. And RS couldn't compete in their own market niche!
Don't blame the minimum-wage employees or the harassed store manager. They are pressured to make daily sales; providing knowledgeable service is not in their job description. Wage advancement and promotions based on service or skill or dedication are no longer factors in retail workforce compensation. Human Resource computers crunch sales figures vs. hourly wage = profit quotient. Minimum wage wins every time.
Sad, tragic even, but it's tough to mourn a corporation that committed suicide by repeatedly shooting itself in both feet until gangrene eventually reached the head.
"Wage advancement and promotions based on service or skill or dedication are no longer factors in retail workforce compensation. Human Resource computers crunch sales figures vs. hourly wage = profit quotient. Minimum wage wins every time."
Too right. Helped a friend apply for retail jobs online (the only way you can with most big firms). No CVs allowed. Was shocked at the questionnaires -- mostly sort of psychology tests designed for a computer to eliminate any marginal candidates. At no point did my friend have a chance to state that she had 10 yrs experience in retail. Companies obviously want cheap, inexperienced, compliant wage fodder.
On a business trip to the U.S a couple of years ago, we needed to get some resistors and a current clamp quickly and so they took us to a Radio Shack.
I can only say that I was seriously disappointed! Mind you, the Radio Shack I remember are from films - like Short Circuit... But still, I expected more, and what I experienced was pretty much what @DerekCurrie describes above. The staff seemed extremely disinterested and largely unhelpful, the store didn't really know what it was selling, quality didn't appear as good the prices would suggest. It was the worst customer experience I had in the U.S.
Sad, but probably for the best.
Check out this insider's story about what it's actually like to work there:
http://www.sbnation.com/2014/11/26/7281129/radioshack-eulogy-stories
It's a bit long, but a good read. I will never moan about my job again.
OK that's an exaggeration. I might not moan about it today.
a good read, and quite enlightening. lots of parallels to I.T. departments of lots of places I've worked. stressed out management just trying to keep it all afloat, employee's nailing things together with chewing gum, sweat, and bits of string, and working for the love of tech and sacrificing any attempt to make a meaningfull wage / career.
as a young boy, the Tandy store in the UK was kinda my bolthole when my parents were doing the weekly shopping trawl up and down the highstreet. they knew where I was, and I was happy poking and prodding wizzy electonic things, and hopefully not bothering anyone.
crazy to think that I could get not only my monthly computing mags, but the quickshot pro joystick mentioned in the reviews in the same newsagents, and Sinclair spectrums and accessories on the shelves.
I was able to play on a NES demo station (and discover arcade perfect games had made it to home console), and dick about on the music keyboards in Boots (a chemist) while my folks got their photo's developed.
then that fateful Christmas of '87 I think, when Tandy got the Amiga500 and AtariST displays put up at front of house.
that was it. game over. a half meg v1.2 rom'd A500 looping the "robocity" demo. I was blown away. I knew my destiny. *choral music* *spotlight shines down from above*
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