Radio Shack May Be Finished

[antiqueshell]

It's really not true that people today and kids for that matter wouldn't be interested in electronics and kits IF they knew what they were doing, and like others have mentioned become like everybody else.

One of the biggest problems was that instead of simply increasing the number of stores they should have limited the number and made sure to still cater to hobbyists and children/students.

Ham radio still is a viable hobby even today. As is kit building.

Radio Shack was even telling people last year that they were going to return to their roots and start carrying more descrete electronic components, amateur radio equipment and supplies, and kits. It would have been a combination of what made these type of stores so popular for so long. The biggest nail in the coffin was when they did what everyone else did.

I wonder where the Tandy Family is today, I'm surprised that someone hasn't attempted to regain some control, I THINK that the family DOES still have limited control of the company. Anyone ?

Yes, I also remember HeathKit I was literally in electronics
heaven when I used to visit that store in the late 70s.
I still miss them.

 

[OtisBlkR1]

I worked at 3 different radio shacks in the mid 90's I recently visited a store and its a far cry from what i was involved with many moons ago. Its a shame. and the merchandise they sell now is way, way overpriced.. Im amazed they are still open.

 

[jcwit]

LOL I haven't been in one since I was kicked out when looking at a VCR and saying something about copying movies.

 

[javacontour]

Mid-90's, the mall was still big. On-line shopping hadn't taken off yet. Folks would pop into Radio Shack while at the mall.

Now, with online shopping hurting most B&M retailers, Radio Shack is one of many victims of the sea change in retail.

Originally Posted By: OtisBlkR1
I worked at 3 different radio shacks in the mid 90's I recently visited a store and its a far cry from what i was involved with many moons ago. Its a shame. and the merchandise they sell now is way, way overpriced.. Im amazed they are still open.

 

[CourierDriver]

Originally Posted By: OneEyeJack
Same path to destruction as Heathkit.


ty for reminding me,,it was Heathkit I remember,,what a book.

 

[OtisBlkR1]

Originally Posted By: javacontour
Mid-90's, the mall was still big. On-line shopping hadn't taken off yet. Folks would pop into Radio Shack while at the mall.

Now, with online shopping hurting most B&M retailers, Radio Shack is one of many victims of the sea change in retail.

Originally Posted By: OtisBlkR1
I worked at 3 different radio shacks in the mid 90's I recently visited a store and its a far cry from what i was involved with many moons ago. Its a shame. and the merchandise they sell now is way, way overpriced.. Im amazed they are still open.


As a matter of fact one of the three locations was a mall, the other two were in strip malls, I was in my early 20's and especially around Christmas Radioshack was always packed, First pagers, the those bagphones, then the 3v white handheld "Zack Morris saved by the bell" cell phones.. the computers with Bose surround, RC cars, and ALOT of watch batteries.. and you would be amazed at the quantity of Optimus audio equipment we sold..

 

[UncleS2]

I remember building a crystal radio kit from Radio Shack when I was a kid, think Dad bought it on a company trip to Dallas. I have several Radio Shack or Realistic brand portable shortwave/AM/FM radios- all made by Sangean for RS, all good to excellent radios. Sure hate to see 'em go under, even though the company itself is largely responsible due to its poor decisions.

 

[Win]

The one I worked at was in a free standing building. Not another Rat Shack for sixty miles, minimum, in any direction.

Every Saturday morning there would be a line at the door where the thieves would be waiting to buy the $1.99 universal power plug kit we sold, so they could hook up the car stereo they jacked the night before.

Every few months the gypsies would blow through, and one person would be tasked to do nothing but watch them for loss control purposes. I guess that's not very PC nowadays, but that's the way it was.

 

[Chris142]

did anybody else go in there at xmas time and turn.on every rc car. then key the cb on ch14a ? back then the toys ran on the 27mhz band,between 14 and 15 on the cb band iirc.

used to do that just to watch the employees chase the rc cars.

 

[Win]

Not having thought about this for decades, but thinking about it now, I think the end game began in the late 70's.

When I started there, as noted there was not another Rat Shack for sixty miles in any direction, but within a couple of years, they had already opened a store in a newly built mall in town, and put in another store in the next town over. But the customer base had not really grown much in that time - they just carved up the business, where each store got less of the existing base.

So I graduated high school, went off to college, and came back and worked after school one summer a few years later. My boss, Ray, who was a pretty astute businessman, saw the writing on the wall and got out of it about then, and that was enough for me.

About a decade later, when I was researching some cases, I ran across one where one of the mid level managers in our area was pretty deeply involved in some dubious employment practices our supreme court took a pretty dim view of. Which didn't surprise me much, we had nicknamed one of his subordinates Rick the (rhymes with Rick).

So I would say the hay day was the early sixties when Mr. Tandy acquired it as a near bankrupt, up to the late 70's. The antitrust deal with Allied hurt as well. After that it was just a matter of time, and once they got rid of the unique house brands and real customer service, which distinguished them, they were pretty much irrelevant.

Lafayette Radio folded in the mid 80's as best I recall, they were probably the only real competitor Rat Shack had until it decided to morph itself into everybody else - and lost.

Sorry for the threadjack. I hate to see them go under - I enjoyed working for them as a kid.

 

[spackard]

Still using my Micronta build-it-yourself VOM, or as we used to call it the Micro-nada. The last thing I bought in Radio Shack was some button-size batteries, because that used to be something that was fresh because they had high turnover of their stock. But it wasn't that fresh, and I can get 10/$1 direct from China.

 

[Errtt]

Still have some RS stuff (DX-375, DX-398 SW radios, couple CBs, antenna's, multimeters, etc.).
I just don't shop there anymore since they gone down the tubes. Besides, I have 2 Fry's close to home, then the internet.

But I had bought a lot of things back in the day from electronic components to stereo systems (remember the Mach One speakers, turntables, receivers and separates?). Headphones, cables, etc.
Still have 2 local RS stores and notice cell phones are the main thing then so little of everything else. I remember a few years ago they tried the sat Tv but guess that's gone now.

I used to like the sales/clearance shopping, not it's Frys and internet shopping.

 

[eljefino]

Originally Posted By: Win


They also had the free battery / month card back in the 70's, and, like clockwork, some people would come in for their free carbon zinc battery. Most wanted the 9V.


Computer City, another Tandy company, had a "floppy disk of the month card". They had a shelf about six feet wide of 3.5" disks vertically stacked, in several nerdy colors, for people to buy (or get free), one at a time.

This pales to HF's coupon deal for 32 free AAs, now doesn't it?

 

[eljefino]

Originally Posted By: Chris142
did anybody else go in there at xmas time and turn.on every rc car. then key the cb on ch14a ? back then the toys ran on the 27mhz band,between 14 and 15 on the cb band iirc.

used to do that just to watch the employees chase the rc cars.


I was too busy setting the alarm clock radios for ten minutes later.

 

[Kruse]

One of my hobbies is audio vacuum tubes. They used to sell a line of tubes that had a lifetime warranty. So if you buy one, it was warrantied for life. Then, they changed the warranty so that if you brought in a failed lifetime-warrantied tube, they'd just give you a new one, but the new one no longer had a lifetime warranty.
I guess the warranty is similar to Craftsman tools, The warranty was killing them.
I stopped being a faithful customer when they stopped printing up their yearly paper catalogs.

 

[antiqueshell]

Maybe now is the perfect time for someone to come in and buy up the RS name, of some of the infrastructure, and revamp it entirely.

I'd eliminate many stores, get rid of the cell phone business, except for accessories like batteries, and the like, and bring back discrete components at competitive prices, Amateur radio gear, and accessories, add lots of kits, also have it become a place where you could take your FCC test for your Amateur ticket, and also add things like modern Ku band (small dishes) Free To All satellite TV and Radio equipment, and support. There is a LOT of neat stuff on satellite that is still free once you buy the equipment.

Also need to hire true electronics geeks that love what they do that can actually answer REAL technical questions.

I'd basically run the company at a slight loss for some years to bring back customers and get new ones in the door.

You want to make the visit an experience, yes I know it sounds
obnoxiously droll now but model it vaguely after the Apple model but in their own unique way. Make folks want to come into the store and stay, and hopefully buy things too.

RS would be a neat project for some enterprising folks that had patience, drive, and an enthusiasm for the kind of products they sell. Perhaps Warren Buffet would bite?

 

[supton]

Problem is, I can go to Mouser for discretes (prefer Digikey, but they have a $25 min), Ham Radio Outlet for ham gear, radio clubs for VE tests. Throw in eBay, qrz.com, Amazon and hamfests and I really don't have a need for an all in one place.

Hobbyists are notoriously cheap.

 

[bradepb]

Originally Posted By: Volvohead
At least the memories can live on:

http://www.radioshackcatalogs.com/catalog_directory.html

Thanks for the link. I found my STA-90 am/fm receiver in the 1977 catalog. It still resides in my basement hooked up and working along with its t-100 tower speakers.

 

[Garak]

Originally Posted By: supton
Problem is, I can go to Mouser for discretes (prefer Digikey, but they have a $25 min), Ham Radio Outlet for ham gear, radio clubs for VE tests. Throw in eBay, qrz.com, Amazon and hamfests and I really don't have a need for an all in one place.

I still miss the loss of Radio Shack up here (replaced by The Source). I don't do a lot of electronic hobby stuff, but it was nice to be able to have a place that had a good selection of wiring, resistors, and so forth when needed. The Source has some, but nowhere near what Radio Shack did. We used to have a local specialty shop for radio stuff (absolutely huge), but they shut down ages ago.

 

[Win]

I've been a ham since I was 13, and most hams are tighter than the bark on trees. I'm the same way - if i can fix it or scratch build it myself, I do. Or I buy it at a hamfest.

I have an empty space in a building I own that I've thought of putting in a little ham shop or gun store just for fun, but the cold hard reality is that most folks will come in to handle the merchandise and size it up, and then order it online to save a dollar and the sales tax. You just wind up tying up a bunch of money in inventory, and if you don't own your own place, you're paying rent and a bunch of overhead to boot for the convenience of people that will ultimately be someone else's faceless customer from a faceless vendor.

Brick and mortar is done for except for big box and products and service that are impractical and inconvenient to purchase online. Making sales tax applicable to all internet sales would level the playing field a little bit, but the brick and mortar guy still has to have employees, bathrooms, ADA compliance, parking lots, shoplifting thieves, an attractive storefront - all very expensive stuff that a web site doesn't have to invest in.

Most everyone laments the loss of domestic industry and good jobs, but they only need to look in the mirror to pin the blame.
People are cheap, and the get it a dollar cheaper mentality, is bringing all the chickens home to roost.

A ham shop / hobby shop would be a great tax loss, but I don't need any more of those. There might still be a buck to be made off of Audiophools, but I imagine even many of them get their magic pebbles and ridiculous cables and power cords on line.

Radio Shack rarely sold ham gear, btw. They did a bit when it was Allied Radio Shack before the antitrust break up. And again in the 90's when they had some VHF gear. But when I worked there, aside from shortwave receivers, and parts and coax and the like, ham gear was not a part of the business. But all of us counter kids were hams and knew what we were talking about and how to fix stuff. That's why our customer service was so good.

edit: these kids are mostly gone now - it takes no technical knowledge to get a ticket these days, it's been dumbed down severely like most of the rest of society so it can be more inclusive. That's why Rat Shack has such clueless employees - the potential base of knowledgeable employees dried up a couple of three decades ago.