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But the solution, IMO, has been staring people in the face for years now -- yet little is really done to take it seriously. We've got to encourage more SMALL business start-ups! Plenty of unemployed people would be quite happy to work for themselves, except there's such a steep wall they run up against when they go from a single person working out of their home to hiring other employees and obtaining a commercial office space.
Our country has a glut of "big box" retailers and large chains that just aren't sustainable anymore, with so many people doing online shopping. On the other hand, if you run small, local businesses with good customer service and relatively low overhead, you can be very successful. (People like to give their money to small, local shops as long as they're competitive on pricing.)
Big mega-corps don't "create jobs", no matter how much profit they earn. (At least, not in any meaningful way.) They're well established and already have a labor pool that's sufficient for everything they do. Extra profit just means raises for the owners and management, vs. viewing it as a new budget to spend on a hiring spree. In fact, hiring more people might upset whatever balance they have in place that made them so successful already.... Too much middle management or too much risk trying to expand into areas they're not familiar with using the extra labor.
Increasingly, the entertainment related goods we buy are intangibles too. You go into a store like Best Buy and half of the place is trying to sell you blu-ray or DVD movies, music CDs or game titles for consoles. But all of those are dying as people start paying to stream their movie content online or purchase console games as downloads over their home internet connections. The concept of having to put these out as products on a retail showroom floor is dying a slow death.
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Originally Posted by Wendell Phillips
I would not be so smug about this, for it is the harbinger of worse to come. I predict that there will be a surge of business failures and bankruptcy. What we are not being told is that more than half of major business is running on commercial credit with "second lien" financing that is in default. The banks know this, which is why they are not lending; they are sitting on the sidelines notwithstanding the Fed's stimulus program to provide "easy money". This is not sustainable indefinitely; and, while bankruptcy filings are currently significantly down, eventually the nation will be awash with business bankruptcy filings, the economic equivalent of a tsunami. With bankruptcy will come rising long-term unemployment, and finally the slide into economic depression. The failure of Congress to act responsibly will only accelerate the crisis pushing us over the brink. It will have a cascading effect that the government’s intervention is desperately trying to avoid - but more likely to only succeed in slowing its inexorable progress. It will be very, very ugly.
There is something sad about Radio Shack's demise, which is not the case with Circuit City, Best Buy, Blockbuster, Sears, and stores like that. I always think of my father's generation of stereo guys who would buy components for their Bozak, Carver, Audio Research and other brands' amplifies, speakers and amps. They bought so much "wimpy wire" and other high-end cables from Radio Shack as well.
It's either a straw man or microcosm, but in so far as resources needed to service these types of hobbies is concerned, it's a world of difference:
I use to be a steady customer of Radio Shack until they discontinued carrying almost everything they were famous for and went to, of all things, Cell phones and accessories...
Couple of my buddies and I got together for lunch yesterday......we ways hit on investing, economy, etc, when we get together a bit and I brought up Radio Shack and the consensus was that the ship has sailed for RS. Now we are just a few simple Joes who have basic financial common sense and we could not come up with any type of product or service RS could sell to save itself............we do know that there are those still out there that are hobbiest and need an electronics store but we all agreed the RS would best serve those with an Internet based company versus brick and motar.
On another note we walked into Best Buy after lunch for my friend to pick up some cabling and he noted it was half the price on Amazon and free shipping with his Amazon Prime.......needless to say he left without it and odered it online.
Not so long ago smart phones, IPads, and many other technological break through items were science fiction. As I see Amazon and others say they will use drone for delivery I think......pipe dream?
In ten years I will no longer need a wallet.....just a smart phone, yesterday I saw a door lock for your home that opens with a touch with accompanying smart phone on hand. Today's brick and motar stores are going to be in a far different place over the coming years. My daughters will most likely be tracking their Amazon delivery on their IPads......incoming.
I love Fry's. Too bad the only locations I am aware of are in California.
I will go to Fry's whenever I am near one just to roam the aisles and see what is there. If I lived near one, it would be the first place I would go to when I needed any tech type product. Maybe with RS closing shop, Fry's might finally see the opportunity to locate some more stores in the east. I can only hope they do.
They are overpriced and failed to compete. The only reason I even go to Radioshack these days is to get some electronics parts (I'm an Electronics graduate and I have hobbies...)
As far as the consumer world is concerned in general though, I don't buy anything from Radioshack.
Problem is even their parts are overpriced now. Buying a resistor for 19 cents a few years ago is 1.49. They are no longer a parts store. They are mostly a trinket or accessory store which should have closed up once they stopped using the Tandy name. It's time for them to simply go under as there is no longer anything unique about them anymore.
I will go to Fry's whenever I am near one just to roam the aisles and see what is there. If I lived near one, it would be the first place I would go to when I needed any tech type product. Maybe with RS closing shop, Fry's might finally see the opportunity to locate some more stores in the east. I can only hope they do.
Fry's used to be geek heaven. We were so excited when one opened up here. It's just like Best Buy now. ( at least here in Vegas)
I use to be a steady customer of Radio Shack until they discontinued carrying almost everything they were famous for and went to, of all things, Cell phones and accessories...
The one I went to at one point were selling videogame accessories, now they barely have a PC section.
I went to my local RS, which is basically a cell phone store, to buy a flash drive. They didn't have any. I went across the street to a Walgreens to buy one.
See, this is where I think VPs and CEOs have lost touch with the reality of little things. Seriously, rent a UHaul for 100 bucks, fill it to the brim with the remaining merch and drive it to the warehouse or other stores. It is the mentality of the people in charge that crack me up. This is no different then when you move yourself. You are strapped for cash, but only look at the top moving companies to move you. The cheapest moving company will charge you 5 grand and you think that this is your only option.
My point is, if they REALLY wanted to close the stores, they could have made it happen.
There is a lot more to closing a store than the posters like this one realize. There are government mandates things to consider. Severance pay for employees. Lease buyouts. Creditors to work things out with, before you can just haul off the merchandise. Etc. Etc.
When you only want to close part of the stores in a chain, it is difficult to do if the company has financial problems, as in closing those stores you don't frighten creditors who will demand to be paid now, which could force you into bankruptcy. In this situation, it can cost you a lot of money to close a store due to all it triggers into being dealt with first.
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