Radio Shack files for bankruptcy again

[KE6KA]

I really think they could be successful if they actually acknowledged part of their problem is nobody is going to pay $24.99 for a USB cable that can be purchased around town starting at about $5.00.

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/03/09/519440212/radioshack-files-for-bankruptcy-again

[W7XF]

Stick a fork in 'em....THEY'RE DONE!!

[KG4CGC]

For a time in the 90's I believe they were selling candy. I dunno. Maybe because Blockbuster was but ... whatever. (lament lament lamentation)

[KD8TUT]

I really think they could be successful if they actually acknowledged part of their problem is nobody is going to pay $24.99 for a USB cable that can be purchased around town starting at about $5.00.

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/03/09/519440212/radioshack-files-for-bankruptcy-again


A million years ago I ran a tech department at Comp USA. Back then they were anticipating the entry of Best Buy and Circuit City into the market and were all freaked out. They just began talking about turning into a discount big box store at the time I left for a network engineer job.

They destroyed themselves. And who stepped into Comp USA's market? Fry's. Who actually has a real computer business.

Radio Shack did the same thing. They had a thing they were good at, then decided that thing was bad, and sold cell phones.

Moral of the story: If you repair cars successfully, don't start baking cakes.

[KE6KA]

A million years ago I ran a tech department at Comp USA. Back then they were anticipating the entry of Best Buy and Circuit City into the market and were all freaked out. They just began talking about turning into a discount big box store at the time I left for a network engineer job.

They destroyed themselves. And who stepped into Comp USA's market? Fry's. Who actually has a real computer business.

Radio Shack did the same thing. They had a thing they were good at, then decided that thing was bad, and sold cell phones.

Moral of the story: If you repair cars successfully, don't start baking cakes.

Fry's has stores in limited markets. I think the only effect they had on Radio Shack was limited to areas with Fry's stores. CompUSA and Fry's coexisted here for many years. Here locally, the big complaint about CompUSA was that they would put on a good sale, but the products were never in stock. To be fair, Best Buy pulled the same stunt.

Frys, CompUSA, Best Buy, PC Mall, Circuit City, Good Guys, PC Club and about 20 local computer/electronic stores were in business here at one point. Most of them were insanely overpriced or had crappy customer service policies that ultimately drove them out of business. Radio Shack had a chain called Incredible Universe here in Sacramento, in Portland, and quite a few other locations that are now Fry's stores. We are down to Fry's, Best Buy, and one local retail electronics store that hates ham radio. Basically, anything that didn't sell stuff people could use to get on the internet at a reasonable price went out of business. Radio Shack sold PCs in the early days of the internet and decided to ditch that product, as well as their traditional line of products, in favor of cell phones. Of course, the difference between buying a phone at Fry's and buying one at Radio Shack is you can also pick up a cell phone charger for $4.99 at Fry's, but that would cost you $29.99 at Radio Shack. I also think Radio Shack should have continued producing selling products under their house brand names. They had a large following of hobbyists who just had to have the latest Realistic scanner or Optimus home entertainment product.

[KG4CGC]

Realistic brand stereos are collectable now not just for the nostalgia but the performance. The dumbing down of the business degree is what killed RS.

[KC2UGV]

Fry's has stores in limited markets. I think the only effect they had on Radio Shack was limited to areas with Fry's stores. CompUSA and Fry's coexisted here for many years. Here locally, the big complaint about CompUSA was that they would put on a good sale, but the products were never in stock. To be fair, Best Buy pulled the same stunt.

Frys, CompUSA, Best Buy, PC Mall, Circuit City, Good Guys, PC Club and about 20 local computer/electronic stores were in business here at one point. Most of them were insanely overpriced or had crappy customer service policies that ultimately drove them out of business. Radio Shack had a chain called Incredible Universe here in Sacramento, in Portland, and quite a few other locations that are now Fry's stores. We are down to Fry's, Best Buy, and one local retail electronics store that hates ham radio. Basically, anything that didn't sell stuff people could use to get on the internet at a reasonable price went out of business. Radio Shack sold PCs in the early days of the internet and decided to ditch that product, as well as their traditional line of products, in favor of cell phones. Of course, the difference between buying a phone at Fry's and buying one at Radio Shack is you can also pick up a cell phone charger for $4.99 at Fry's, but that would cost you $29.99 at Radio Shack. I also think Radio Shack should have continued producing selling products under their house brand names. They had a large following of hobbyists who just had to have the latest Realistic scanner or Optimus home entertainment product.

I honestly think if RS dusted off some of the old schematics they had, and started selling kits for their older PC products, they could have a chance. Toss in kit forms for all their ham gear they sold.

Yep, kits. Kits are making a comeback, with niche markets. Especially an updated kit form of their Color Computer 3. It could give the Raspberry Pi a run for it's money, due to all of the analog and digital inputs and outputs it has, and how easy it is to write code for it. Not to mention 30+ years of hobbyist add-ons for the unit. We have Cocos out there with 8MB of RAM running a slimmed down version of UNIX today. You can even run an RTOS on the device. It truly was and is still an amazing piece of hardware.

The ham gear AFAIK, has always been solid. Imagine a 10M multi-mode kit? HTX-100's are super popular as transverters. I still use an HTX-420. A kit form of the 420 wouldn't work, but selling them will still, even if you only make them online-order.

But the $25 USB cables don't work. And, neither does jumping on you to buy a cell phone upon entrance to the store.

[W3WN]

Unfortunately, Corey, that's not going to happen.

Not that you're wrong -- I think you've put your finger on the start of a road to recovery for whatever is left of RatShack. The problem is that the decision makers at the middle-management level can't or won't see that. These are the geniuses who bet the company on cell/smart phones and ditched almost everything else.

IMHO, they lack the vision to admit that they were wrong, or that conditions changed and that they didn't change with them. Well, either that, or their egos won't let them admit it. Either way, they've had 2 years to implement something on the lines of what you suggest, and didn't -- or at best, went through the motions.

The Shack is dead.

Now maybe, just maybe, someone with some $$ and some vision will buy up what's left of the company at the bankruptcy fire sale and try and do something like what you suggest. If that happens, don't be surprised if they ditch the RatShack name, just because of the baggage.

Because too many customers or potential customers think their real slogan was "You've got questions? We've got cell phones!" and that said attitude hasn't really changed.

[KC2UGV]

Unfortunately, Corey, that's not going to happen.

Not that you're wrong -- I think you've put your finger on the start of a road to recovery for whatever is left of RatShack. The problem is that the decision makers at the middle-management level can't or won't see that. These are the geniuses who bet the company on cell/smart phones and ditched almost everything else.

IMHO, they lack the vision to admit that they were wrong, or that conditions changed and that they didn't change with them. Well, either that, or their egos won't let them admit it. Either way, they've had 2 years to implement something on the lines of what you suggest, and didn't -- or at best, went through the motions.

The Shack is dead.

Now maybe, just maybe, someone with some $$ and some vision will buy up what's left of the company at the bankruptcy fire sale and try and do something like what you suggest. If that happens, don't be surprised if they ditch the RatShack name, just because of the baggage.

Because too many customers or potential customers think their real slogan was "You've got questions? We've got cell phones!" and that said attitude hasn't really changed.

Oh, I def agree with you. Wont happen. Sadly? There's a group trying to build a bare metal Coco3 compatible board today. There are a couple of gaps, mainly the GIME chip. During the sale, the design specs will most assuredly be lost forever, and the project will die. Without these specs, it can never be completed, and the project has been working to get their hands on these.

Thankfully, it appears RS sold off the specs for the ham radio stuff. You can still buy HTX-10's and HTX-100's. Albrecht makes them :)

[W3WN]

Do you have a link to Albrecht? The only one that's relevant that I can find points to RadioWorld UK. And it appears to be a little, ah, out of date.

[KE6KA]

Thankfully, it appears RS sold off the specs for the ham radio stuff. You can still buy HTX-10's and HTX-100's. Albrecht makes them :)

Albrecht is one of the names used by Midland, along with Alan and CTE. I would be very surprised if those are the same products as the HTX-10 and HTX-100 due to the very likelihood of component obsolescence.

[W3WN]

Albrecht is one of the names used by Midland, along with Alan and CTE. I would be very surprised if those are the same products as the HTX-10 and HTX-100 due to the very likelihood of component obsolescence.
Might be newer versions of them.

I had an HTX-100 quite a few years back. Fun little rig to have in the van, back when 10 could be counted on to be open most days. Wouldn't mind having another one or a similar one... as long as it's a real 10 meter rig, not something masquerading as such, if you know what I mean.

[KC2UGV]

Do you have a link to Albrecht? The only one that's relevant that I can find points to RadioWorld UK. And it appears to be a little, ah, out of date.

Nevermind, I guess.... Looks like they're no more, as I can't find their site.

[KE6KA]

Do you have a link to Albrecht? The only one that's relevant that I can find points to RadioWorld UK. And it appears to be a little, ah, out of date.

The link depends on the country you are in. The general site for Europe is http://www.midlandeurope.com/en/category/23800-radio-cb#vhf-uhf CTE is their international distributor and Alan Electronics distributes products regionally. Their German site has Amateur equipment listed. https://www.alan-electronics.de/Produkte/Funktechnik-Amateurfunk-Handgeraete.aspx

[W7XF]

The Shack is dead.
Sprint is also just about dead.

[KG4CGC]

I am reminded that there is more neat stuff on Amazon. Not AR stuff though unless you want a $33 UV5R (version whatever). Don't get me wrong. Those are excellent 2m HH rigs. You can find the YaeKenCom HF rigs but at full retail. I miss Heathkit even though I only built the digital (flouroscreen) clock. My cousin and uncle built the big GR-64 or something like it in that line. It was wired to an outdoor dipole directly on a canal of the South Florida coast. I spent hours spinning dials when I had the chance although I have to admit that my tiny little Tecsun PL-660 puts it to shame. I know, apples and oranges. I have been able to test the Tecsun in various locations as it is just larger than a paperback. NC mountains, Key West, rest stop in Eastern Tennessee, the big cliff face known as Caesars Head only a couple of miles from the SC/NC state line on the SC side just to name 4. I want to start taking the ArgoV places. That will require a little more forethought on my part. The main thing planning what antenna and how. The spool of wire has always served me well on a steep rock face.

[KG4CGC]

Oh yeah. I was going to say something about Lafayette in that last post. I went to a Lafayette once AND a Heathkit store!