Staples - Death Watch... closing 225 Stores.

[foghorn67]

I like the Staples around me. They have friendly copy centers too. Beats going to FedEx/Kinko's or UPS/MailBox Etc.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

I like the Staples around me. They have friendly copy centers too. Beats going to FedEx/Kinko's or UPS/MailBox Etc.

Amen, at the local Kinko's it takes one minute thirty seconds to print each page at the selfserve copiers.

 

[foghorn67]

Amen, at the local Kinko's it takes one minute thirty seconds to print each page at the selfserve copiers.

Woah...glad I haven't walked into one of those in a while. Last time I was there I swore I would never walk into one unless it was an emergency.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

Woah...glad I haven't walked into one of those in a while. Last time I was there I swore I would never walk into one unless it was an emergency.

I'm pretty sure they set it up that way so you'll pay the higher price at the HelpDesk. Don't even think about doing last minute work on files /projects on their workstations.

 

[Raduque]

Since I moved out here to West Texas and am living in an apartment, I find that I'm reluctant to buy things online. I do not trust the neighbors, and my doorway is street-facing.

More retail stores closing is not a good thing for me. Unless I can find a house. But rent is currently astronomical because of the oil field.

 

[mmntech]

Staples is doing alright. Most of their business is corporate and online, so closing retail stores is a logical move.

This. Most businesses are going to buy their office supplies in bulk, which means from the corporate catalogue or online. Consumers don't buy a lot of stationary anymore. The stores they have really don't need to be as big as they are.

 

[Eli]

Only from a nostalgia perspective. They've been pretty worthless for years now if you want electronic parts that aren't batteries.

I guess I reluctantly agree. I loved the Radio Shack catalogs when I was a kid.

It's the same problem someone mentioned earlier overall though. Sure, you can get much... much better deals online, but if you need something now, it is nice having a local resource like Radio Shack for a connector, breadboard, certain value resistor, etc etc.

I once traveled to 5 radio shack locations to pick up the parts I needed for a project that night. I didn't want to wait for an online order, and shipping it overnight probably would have about evened out the cost anyway. I don't want to see Radio Shack go away, so am happy to give them my money.. I must have spent at least $500 there last year... lol. I even joked with my local store that I was single handedly keeping them afloat, but $500 is nothing really. I spent 4x that at Mouser.

 

[Staples]

Oh no. My favorite store...


Ok, my handle has nothing to do with the store.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I just thought of something funny, but kind of sad at same time. I'm just picture the CEO laying off all the workers of the stores closing down.

"That was easy"

 

[88keys]

It's like this.
The electronics section of any of these stores is always shit. What little they do have will be the worst products being sold at the highest possible markups. Anybody with 2 brain cells to rub together knows that 99.9999999% of the best deals are online and the pirce difference is often significant. To stay profitable, these businesses rely on people who don't know any better and just buy whatever the employees recommend.
But as upgrade cycles slow down and people are become smarter shoppers by consulting, social media, forums, etc. they learn not to fall for this crap.

 

[zerocool84]

This. Most businesses are going to buy their office supplies in bulk, which means from the corporate catalogue or online. Consumers don't buy a lot of stationary anymore. The stores they have really don't need to be as big as they are.

Yup, my company buys all of our office supplies from Staples from a catalog.

 

[SKORPI0]

I just thought of something funny, but kind of sad at same time. I'm just picture the CEO laying off all the workers of the stores closing down.

"That was easy"

 

[brett_stevens]

The electronics section of any of these stores is always shit.

I have wondered this as well. Do they realize they are pissing away huge opportunities? They also tend to stay open late, which makes me think they'd be good places to have more of the kind of parts you need when working late, not fewer.

Then again, you can now get extensive computer parts at some Wal-Marts, Targets, CVSs, etc. so the competition is stiffer too.

 

[Destiny]

did anyone ever figure how Radio Shack survived for so long?

Radioshack has been the largest and most successful authorized re-seller for Sprint, at one time they activated more new Sprint customers than anyone else including Sprint themselves - 15 years ago it was very profitable, but Re-Seller commissions are very low now since carriers require data plan activations to get additional commission and the total was nothing close to what it was 15 years ago.

Basically wireless activations is what keeping them afloat. But you can now get new phone activations anywhere and everywhere that chipped away at the Shack's core business...