Slashdot Mirror
Circuit City Closes Its Doors For Good
bsharma is amongst the hordes of people wanting us to share the news that long beleaguered retailer Circuit City has finally decided to close for good, asking for court approval to close the remaining 567 US stores. "Whalin said management mistakes over the past few years combined with the recession brought down Circuit City. 'This company made massive mistakes,' he said, citing a decision to get rid of sales people and other mismanagement. What's more, given the credit market freeze, Whalin added that no manufacturer wants to sell to any retailer who doesn't have money to pay for the merchandise. At the same time, Whalin said there's still a very slim chance that one or more firms that have expressed an interest in buying Circuit City could still buy it out of bankruptcy over the next few days."
Their own bankruptcy?
Consumers are clearly using their purchase power to go where the deals are (online). BB will be the next to go if they don't compete.
There's still Office Depot and similar stores, which you may have noticed are moving into consumer electronics to a degree (e.g., that's where I got my TV.) And, of course, the elephant in the living room: online competition. For items like TV's and stereos, most people are probably more comfortable buying something they can actually see and hear in the store -- but when it comes to, say, buying a printer or an external hard drive, there's really no reason to shop brick-and-mortar.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
You know, I was thinking the same thing. It seems to me that brick and mortar companies are going to have to re-invent themselves as true customer service companies if they want to stay in business. They are never going to beat online retailers on price even with shipping costs. If BB can provide informed sales staff and a good selection of products that is at least close to online prices they may have a chance.
Here in Montreal, we have a bunch of stores that are ran by Circuit City, dubbed "The Source by Circuit City". Basically a chain with overpriced items and clueless employees. Doesn't surprise me one bit that their doors are closing, especially with the aggressive market we're in now. Has anyone seen what Dell is selling these days? Pretty much everything, and their prices are the lowest of the low*. Disclaimer: I am a Value Added Reseller (VAR) for Dell.
Sorry for staff, glad for cheap electronics. Now if only I had money.
Of course, the moral of your story is that the little mom 'n pop store bent over backwards to give you high quality service; but only ended up getting best buy prices... That isn't really an inspiring tale of the victory of the little guy.
You should have paid the $220 more at the local store. They provided the excellent service and deserve it.
Unless you want everyone to provide the same crappy service for cheap prices.
The sales guy earned it, don't you think????
If you ever wonder why you get crappy service at the big box store, it is because when price is all that matters to the customer, then having better informed (higher cost) sales reps is an expense they can't afford.
1) Price
2) Quality
3) Service
Pick any two. If you want better service, reward it.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
I felt the same way about CompUSA.
My guess is that as the economy manages to sort itself out over the next year or so you'll see a comeback in smaller individual stores, local/regional chains, etc. that provide MUCH better service. I think consumers are becoming more and more savvy when it comes to realizing that they need to think about things like after-sale service & support, and the big box stores simply don't provide that with any sense of reliability or consistency.
I wish you were right, but I think the opposite is true. I love local electronics/hi-fi stores. The masses won't go to them, however, because they typically don't stock the low-end, low-priced products, and can't beat Walmart on the prices. In a recession, people won't go for premium.
Lex orandi, lex credendi.
No, but it is a good example of how little stores can really earn customer loyalty,.. it's also an example of what best buy might have to become some day since fewer and fewer people (over time) are going to bother going to a big box. Probably within the next 10-15 years their cash cow (DVD and CDs) will probably start drying up.
Having seen plenty of these (Sharper Image and Mervyns come to mind), those liquidations are usually disappointing. First phase: everything is 10-20% off, no better than the rotation of items on sale.
Next, you start seeing the goobers on street corners with "Circuit City Going out of Business - everything 20-40% off" signs. You go in there and anything interesting is 20% off. You buy something for 20%, no returns allowed. You end up hating the item or seeing it on sale at Target for less next week.
Now, the signs say 40-60% off. You go in and it's picked through and open box shit. You go home.
Finally, the 80% off signal. You go in to buy something, anything. The fluorescent lights, their enclosures, and a few display cases are on sale.
From what I remember, in the late 1980s/early 1990s we didn't have Circuit City or Best Buy here in Chicago. The electronics stores around here were called Highland, Silo, and Omni. They all went out of business during the recession of the early 1990s. It seems like history has repeated itself once again. Lesson learned, don't hold stock in electronics retailers during a recession.
Yeah, but electronics retailers aren't the only ones going out of business. Linens'N'Shit is closing, and I understand Chrysler and GM (hey, what about Ford?) are in deep trouble.
So I think you could generalize to say something like "Don't hold stock in a poorly run company in a crowded market." Then again, isn't that good advice in general?
People aren't afraid to spend too much money if they get good service. And that was precisely what Circuit City did. They fired all of their best, most expert sales and service staff because they cost more. They replaced these people with kids off the street and they got what they paid for.
It was bad customer experience that killed Circuit City. The bean counters thought they could improve their bottom line by lowering payroll costs but they neglected to consider that it would damage the store's reputation and drive customers away. We see this time and time again. Every time you see IT salaries fall and people start leaving the field, what is left? Do they really think they can fire skill and experience and replace it with inexperience and STILL maintain productivity, efficiency and quality of service?
At the next CEO/CFO conference, I hope this is topic for discussion -- they are destroying their businesses with short-term greed. And every time I see it happen, it is tragic... and they never learn from it.
The small guys got the business. In this economy that is huge. Survival through blood, sweat, and tears is rarely "an inspiring tale", except when it is told by the survivors to their thriving descendants.
The advent of DVD was a huge time for consumer electronics. And Circuit City tried to hijack it with their own pay-as-you-go scheme called DIVX ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DIVX_(Digital_Video_Express) ), not to be confused with the video codec DiVX. To put it mildly, it pissed off legions of die-hard gadget junkies... you know, the ones who advise their friends and family about technology purchases. The way the company handled that left a bad taste in the mouths of the customers they needed most...the ones who actually buy the high-tech gizmos.
Thankfully DIVX failed, but I never forgave Circuit City for that and I never spent another cent in their stores and neither did many of my friends and family because of it. I'm not alone.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
Radioshack and (if you're on the West coast) Frys still sell niche components
I haven't seen a niche component in stock at a Radioshack in years. Unless you consider a Sprint phone to be a Niche component, anyways.
As far as I have seen, the days of going to Radioshack for circuit boards and resistors for home hobby projects are long gone.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.