I'll be looking forward to hopefully picking up some choice pieces during the liquidation, but I think I'd rather it not go down this way all the same.
Saw that this morning, as well. Looks like their attempts to keep afloat by closing a bunch of stores wasn't enough.
It's sad to see any retailer go under, but particularly so when it's a larger one like this. Even more so when the path to this end has been pretty well documented (attempted acquisition of Blockbuster, among other things).
That being said, the last time I was at a big-box technology retailer, I found it very difficult to find anything I really wanted to spend money on. I've been highly addicted to places that are more like MicroCenter, which caters more to the 'I know I want this part, where is it?' crowd than the big-box places, which try to sell you on things.
Yeah... I remember when Fretter was in business. They handled appliances and electronics. They were a good store... We have Tweeter but they are upper end and not really in the same league as Best Buy. Too bad...
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KwitkoSheriff of Banning (Retired)By the thing near the stuffIcrontian
edited January 2009
Be careful when buying during a liquidation. Many times the companies in charge will jack the price, then "discount" it with a flashy sign saying 20% OFF BUY ME NAO!!!! Be a good consumer and check out prices before making a purchase. If the item doesn't move, the liquidators will then discount the item below cost.
This is too bad. I have a friend that's employed by Circuit City too. I hope that Best Buy or someone else gets more business and can pick up some of the displaced workers. : /
Tweeter filed for bankruptcy in Nov 08. Some stores closed so fast, they didn't even let people pick up stuff they already paid for....
Really? WOW, didn't know that... Well, that's another electronics store GONE.
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LeonardoWake up and smell the glaciersEagle River, AlaskaIcrontian
edited January 2009
I hope that Best Buy or someone else gets more business and can pick up some of the displaced workers.
I do wish the best for the workers, for workers of any concern that get laid off. As to Worst Buy picking up the slack.... I hate that place, even up here where they are the ONLY electronics store of size. They simply stink when it comes to computer parts prices and selection. I used to buy about a third of my computer-related tech at locally, CompUSA on sale, when they were in business. Our CompUSA, one of the handful of profitable locations, went down with the ship. I did NOT move my business over to Best Buy. For computer components, Best Buy caters to the clueless with fat wallets.
CC's closing has nothing to do with today's economy. The economy just help push it over the edge sooner than later.
I worked at CC for a month or two some or 6 or 7 years ago. Back then I said to myself this place will eventually close.I've also said the same thing about Ritz camera, the Disney store, Sony Shop, and the Apple store. Personally, I'm not shedding any tears.
CC just seemed like an over ambitious and claustrophobic TV shop. Then there was the horrible sales culture they pushed on their sales people. Couple that with a dimly lit environment, and you have a recipe for disaster in today's market of, open, big box, shops.
It tried to change, but all of that was a dollar and a day short. Also, the real changes they did need to make would have been too expensive to make, given the amount of stores they had. Don't get me started on the checkout experience, or locations, or ridiculous parking lots.
Woa, I said more than I meant to. Just I got such a bad impression working there all those years ago, I guess I needed to vent. lol
Not that it was a choice place for buying electronics. It was still too expensive with bad selection of product, but when it came down to it, I went to CC before I touched Best Buy.
Hate BB so much....
I bought my 22in display at CC. They had a great selection, competitive prices, ect. I'd never buy a display online. I'm the type that needs to look at it and trust the transport it safe. CC was a good store for something like that.
Guess I won't miss it, I saw this coming as well. I'll just keep buying online as I have before...
Best Buy's Geek Squad is one of the biggest rip-offs I have ever seen. I've walked into BB stores, and gone to the GS and played dumb, asking questions, etc, to see what they charged for work compared to what I charge. They were about 60% higher than me.
Once I was looking for a stick of DDR2 ram for someone's computer. Geek Squad sold it for $120, I went to Staples and bought the SAME stick for $50.
KwitkoSheriff of Banning (Retired)By the thing near the stuffIcrontian
edited January 2009
OMG. I feel so bad for the sales guy I met a CC the other day. He used to work on Wall Street, his company laid off everybody, he couldn't find another job on the trading floor, so went to CC because he had to pay the bills. Now he's going to lose 2 jobs in a year's time.
In Canada, CC bought up Radio Shack and all their locations. Radio Shack was an old school tech company that sold odds and ends for TVs, electrical work and anything else that had an once of technology related material. Once CC took over they got rid of all the bits and pieces and try selling only TVs, Video Games, and any "big box" item. At that point I knew CC was going under.
In the West Coast we have Future Shop, a company that is now owned by BB but sells all it's products for cheaper!!!
So we got some fake competition going on between Best Buy and Future Shop even though they are owned by the same company... o_O
Anyways, Circuit City, you suck. You bought out Radio Shack, took away everything that made them good and tried to compete with a company twice as big as you. Silly Americans.
We can all feel pity for them, but it's people like us who are causing this to happen. With the advent of newegg, amazon, and websites like fatwallet.com, we are all saving tons of money doing purchases online. The downfall to this whole thing is that while we are doing this we are driving business out for a lot of B&M stores. These numbers will get worse as time goes on as more and more of the consumer base expands their online shopping habits. The only B&M computer store I frequent at all now is Microcenter and that is because their prices are competitive to Newegg, so I can go get a quick replacement part in case of emergency.
Newegg and thats it Id go to CC on the days blue rays were released and get them for 20 bucks sometimes, but other than that, Newegg amazon....... Closet microcenter is in phili bah
CC had nothing that target, walmart, staples, HHgregg, Best buy etc. doesn't have. Won't miss.
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LeonardoWake up and smell the glaciersEagle River, AlaskaIcrontian
edited January 2009
Cambrose, a well-organized and managed brick and mortar retail operation can still compete with online vendors. There is still a huge market segment that desires to see the product on a shelf and touch it before purchasing. Although the physical stores do have a disadvantage with overhead costs, they have the advantage of engaging the local community.
CompUSA is an example. CompUSA did not go out of business because of online competition, they collapsed due to gross mismanagement at the corporate level. Their sales and rebates campaigns were not well coordinated, their centralized inventory tracking was chaos, bulk orders at corporate level were haphazard, et cetera. Incompetent leadership killed CompUSA, not the TigerDirects, Directrons, or Newegg.
Circuit City? I don't have much of a perspective on them. It's been about six years since I've been in one. I just remember that it seemed like a good place to buy TVs and other 'big' items, but was somewhat limited in computer components. To me, it seemed like just a large Best Buy without all the noise and throngs of teenagers. Hmm, I'm starting to remember more now - mainly clueless sales clerks.
We bought our new tv and hts at CC. Too bad cause I got a really good deal on it.
But yeh, it's not the internet's fault that they collapsed. And even if it was it is only the free market at work. I will never pay more for a product than I have to. I will go to the most cost efficient place possible. CC was operating on an old management paradigm
CompUSA is an example. CompUSA did not go out of business because of online competition, they collapsed due to gross mismanagement at the corporate level. Their sales and rebates campaigns were not well coordinated, their centralized inventory tracking was chaos, bulk orders at corporate level were haphazard, et cetera. Incompetent leadership killed CompUSA, not the TigerDirects, Directrons, or Newegg.
This confuses me. CompUSA is, to my knowledge, still very much in business- and I do believe that they recently bought Tigerdirect. I know for a fact that they own the TigerDirect store near me.
This confuses me. CompUSA is, to my knowledge, still very much in business- and I do believe that they recently bought Tigerdirect. I know for a fact that they own the TigerDirect store near me.
It's the other way around. Tiger Direct bought some Compusa stores and I think the rights to the corporate name. What was compusa is gone. Tiger Direct now runs it.
LeonardoWake up and smell the glaciersEagle River, AlaskaIcrontian
edited January 2009
CompUSA started as a chain of stores in the 90's. It eventually became a huge business with several hundred stores in all medium and major cities. Later CompUSA added an online sales component for business and consumers. In late 2007 CompUSA's then new owner gave up on keeping the giant afloat. Finding no one interested in keeping the business running, he sold the stores, warehouses, and inventory to a liquidator. Except for four or five stores, the entire physical component of the business was liquidated and the stores were closed permanently. The CompUSA name and online business was sold to a new owner.
There were a number of profitable CompUSA stores, but unfortunately most of them were gutted and liquidated along with the rotten stores.
Oh. My bad then. I wonder why then all the computers in the Tiger Direct store take you to the compUSA site and not to the Tiger Direct site....Strange.
Management blew, Unorganized and untrained, Sales people were generally a joke, Stock well maybe we could check it if our computer system wasn't from 1970, The only thing CC ever wanted us to do was sell them what they wanted to hear and then sell them a crappy CC plan to " back it up "
Here u go sir your 9 dollar flash drive by the way would u like to spend an extra 15 bucks for the 2 year warranty? THAT right there sent people out the door
There are only something like 30-40 actual CompUSA stores left, they're primarily down in Florida now.
I went to check out the liquidation sales today and lolled my way right back out of the stores. TB hard drive for $170, MX Revolution for $105, Blu-Ray for 20% off of $30-35. I'll check next week when they're more desperate.
QCH
Ancient GuruChicago Area - USA Icrontian
Comments
I'll be looking forward to hopefully picking up some choice pieces during the liquidation, but I think I'd rather it not go down this way all the same.
It's sad to see any retailer go under, but particularly so when it's a larger one like this. Even more so when the path to this end has been pretty well documented (attempted acquisition of Blockbuster, among other things).
That being said, the last time I was at a big-box technology retailer, I found it very difficult to find anything I really wanted to spend money on. I've been highly addicted to places that are more like MicroCenter, which caters more to the 'I know I want this part, where is it?' crowd than the big-box places, which try to sell you on things.
???
Tweeter filed for bankruptcy in Nov 08. Some stores closed so fast, they didn't even let people pick up stuff they already paid for....
This is too bad. I have a friend that's employed by Circuit City too. I hope that Best Buy or someone else gets more business and can pick up some of the displaced workers. : /
I worked at CC for a month or two some or 6 or 7 years ago. Back then I said to myself this place will eventually close.I've also said the same thing about Ritz camera, the Disney store, Sony Shop, and the Apple store. Personally, I'm not shedding any tears.
CC just seemed like an over ambitious and claustrophobic TV shop. Then there was the horrible sales culture they pushed on their sales people. Couple that with a dimly lit environment, and you have a recipe for disaster in today's market of, open, big box, shops.
It tried to change, but all of that was a dollar and a day short. Also, the real changes they did need to make would have been too expensive to make, given the amount of stores they had. Don't get me started on the checkout experience, or locations, or ridiculous parking lots.
Woa, I said more than I meant to. Just I got such a bad impression working there all those years ago, I guess I needed to vent. lol
Not that it was a choice place for buying electronics. It was still too expensive with bad selection of product, but when it came down to it, I went to CC before I touched Best Buy.
Hate BB so much....
I bought my 22in display at CC. They had a great selection, competitive prices, ect. I'd never buy a display online. I'm the type that needs to look at it and trust the transport it safe. CC was a good store for something like that.
Guess I won't miss it, I saw this coming as well. I'll just keep buying online as I have before...
Once I was looking for a stick of DDR2 ram for someone's computer. Geek Squad sold it for $120, I went to Staples and bought the SAME stick for $50.
Office Depot went under here last month.
In the West Coast we have Future Shop, a company that is now owned by BB but sells all it's products for cheaper!!!
So we got some fake competition going on between Best Buy and Future Shop even though they are owned by the same company... o_O
Anyways, Circuit City, you suck. You bought out Radio Shack, took away everything that made them good and tried to compete with a company twice as big as you. Silly Americans.
P.S.- I
CompUSA is an example. CompUSA did not go out of business because of online competition, they collapsed due to gross mismanagement at the corporate level. Their sales and rebates campaigns were not well coordinated, their centralized inventory tracking was chaos, bulk orders at corporate level were haphazard, et cetera. Incompetent leadership killed CompUSA, not the TigerDirects, Directrons, or Newegg.
Circuit City? I don't have much of a perspective on them. It's been about six years since I've been in one. I just remember that it seemed like a good place to buy TVs and other 'big' items, but was somewhat limited in computer components. To me, it seemed like just a large Best Buy without all the noise and throngs of teenagers. Hmm, I'm starting to remember more now - mainly clueless sales clerks.
But yeh, it's not the internet's fault that they collapsed. And even if it was it is only the free market at work. I will never pay more for a product than I have to. I will go to the most cost efficient place possible. CC was operating on an old management paradigm
This confuses me. CompUSA is, to my knowledge, still very much in business- and I do believe that they recently bought Tigerdirect. I know for a fact that they own the TigerDirect store near me.
It's the other way around. Tiger Direct bought some Compusa stores and I think the rights to the corporate name. What was compusa is gone. Tiger Direct now runs it.
There were a number of profitable CompUSA stores, but unfortunately most of them were gutted and liquidated along with the rotten stores.
Management blew, Unorganized and untrained, Sales people were generally a joke, Stock well maybe we could check it if our computer system wasn't from 1970, The only thing CC ever wanted us to do was sell them what they wanted to hear and then sell them a crappy CC plan to " back it up "
Here u go sir your 9 dollar flash drive by the way would u like to spend an extra 15 bucks for the 2 year warranty? THAT right there sent people out the door
I went to check out the liquidation sales today and lolled my way right back out of the stores. TB hard drive for $170, MX Revolution for $105, Blu-Ray for 20% off of $30-35. I'll check next week when they're more desperate.