Source: CNN

New York (CNN Business)Fry's Electronics suddenly closed all of its stores overnight, ending a nearly four-decade run in business.

The company, which had 31 stores across nine US states, said in a statement on its website that it "made the difficult decision to shut down its operations and close its business permanently" because of changing consumer shopping habits and the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

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-= Cloud 9 =-

It's sad to see the place finally closed down. I bought parts there for my first PC build in my younger days :) and I bought several home appliances over the years there, too.

In the last 5 years or so, I always wonder how they managed to stay opened. In the 5 years before that, my rules of thumb is to go there and buy something if only I need it now, and cannot wait for a slow boat from China. And don't talk to any of the salespersons (they usually don't know enough to give you advices).

Radioshack was the same story.

They failed to adapt to the Internet era. I imagine they could have been doing extremely well if they have gone the Newegg model. And use the store front like Apple Store (well trained Genius Bar personels).

My guess Best Buy will be the next to go out of business.

-bodhi
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/2021 06:37PM by bodhi.

bodhi Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It's sad to see the place finally closed down. I
> bought parts there for my first PC build in my
> younger days :) and I bought several home
> appliances over the years there, too.
>
> In the last 5 years or so, I always wonder how
> they managed to stay opened. In the 5 years before
> that, my rules of thumb is to go there and buy
> something if only I need it now, and cannot wait
> for a slow boat from China. And don't talk to any
> of the salespersons (they usually don't know
> enough to give you advices).
>
> Radioshack was the same story.
>
> They failed to adapt to the Internet era. I
> imagine they could have been doing extremely well
> if they have gone the Newegg model. And use the
> store front like Apple Store (well trained Genius
> Bar personels).
>
> My guess Best Buy will be the next to go out of
> business.

Oh man it broke my heart the day a 35-watt solder iron melted a Radio Shark/Tandy/Realistic switch useless just soldering a wire to it without a heat sink (clip)! Back in the day, people using Radio Shark batteries were viewed as money conscious but still an altogether lower caste.

One other thought, the global chip shortage is attributed to Covid 19, but I thought chips are made by robots and they shouldn't get Covid 19 to muck everything up as alleged? I think it was automotive chips.

I don't know is this is off topic, but I'm still holding out for a magazine with a free Linux computer in it; didn't' quite have that happen here. I checked and saw none of them but other wise an incredible selection of Linux magazines that helped me visual-heavy.

And then next day they announced they were going out of business! I've got the luck sometimes, ask anything i plugged into the backwards-powered USB outlet in 2018! Ouch that was a harsh day and I haven't repaired it all! 8-(

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-= Cloud 9 =-

Yes and it's a sad story that Fry's went caput.

I used to shope its local store nearby my house until a couple of years ago I started trusting to buy from any online stores, i.e. AliExpress, Amazon, eBay, and/or NewEgg, to save money. I don't mind waiting for the shipment to arrive.

Bodhi is right that Fry's salespeople in every Fry's store didn't know enough to give advices. Many a time I had to speak to their technicians and to my surprise some didn't even know the answers I was asking. For instance, I was asking some questions related to VoIP (at the time the store did sell the Vonage ATA adapter, i.e. Linksys PAP2, etc.),, and got a response as if they never heard the words VoIP and/or ATA. To me, that's kind of a waste in the investment to hire so many redundant employees with almost no knowledges on the products they represent to sell.