Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon - Page 2

Moron shoppers will foil my bargain hunting ... again

My knee-jerk reaction to this news was, "Cool, I'll buy a TV, a new receiver or several blu-rays at deep discounts." But then I remembered 5 years ago.

Ultimate Electronics went out of business. I went to their store in Austin after they had their GOING OUT OF BUSINESS signs all over the building. I was trying to buy a new TV at the time, and I thought with those signs, everything must be at least half price. Well, guess what, I thought wrong. Everything was only 10 or 20 percent off. Some sale, I thought.

But guess what again, the idiots were buying everything! Most of the TVs were only 10 percent off, but people were in heaven, spending like crazy. WTF???

Given how consistently people disappoint me, I expect to see much of the same at CC. People buying before the bargains ever materialize.

Re: I'll not miss them

And even that cost-cutting didn't help keep the stores profitable. If you're trying to assert that what they did was a bad idea, what the heck do you think would have been a better idea? Incurring even more cost?

Don't get me wrong -- if you're trying to say that they should have just given up and went out of business last year, because there was no profitable business plan possible, then perhaps you have a point. However, other than that, if you're trying to say that "playing hard and fast" was not the right move, then I think you're way off-base.

What's good for the suppliers is not necessarily good for the consumer; that's not news. Sometimes, the consumer isn't paying enough attention, and what's good for the suppliers succeeds. That time it didn't. I think you're trying to ascribe nefarious intentions to something that was simply business.

Doubtful. That was so long ago, that it counts as ancient history. What did Circuit City in was the ascendancy of Amazon.com and its ilk. In just the one year prior to the discontinuation of the DIVX rental system, AMZN shot up from about $16 to $62 per share. That specific point in time was the beginning of the end for Circuit City, but not because of DIVX. Indeed, DIVX, if it was successful, might have been Circuit City's saving grace in all this. However, DIVX was ten years before its time; the big problem was that the physical media was necessary, and at that time, more costly than it is today. You will see today's version of DIVX, prospering, over the next couple of years, as several companies move to a more broadband-based online video model. They benefit from electronic delivery, and therefore no cost for the media. Netflix Watch Instantly, for example, is what DIVX always should have been, but simply was not practical until recently.

Up until the ascendancy of Amazon.com and its ilk, Circuit City actually did quite well, making generally good decisions. It is incredibly easy to have perfect hind-sight. I suspect that it is likely that short of basically buying (all of) Amazon.com when it was at $16, Circuit City was doomed as of Amazon.com's ascendancy, and no other decision (i.e., no decision other than buying or building Amazon.com in 1999) would have saved Circuit City.

And if you think that Best Buy disproves this, get back to me in five years and we'll go over how many B&M stores Best Buy still has, then. Indeed, I suspect the main reason why Best Buy is doing better than Circuit City is that they had the luck of deciding to go online sooner and stronger than Circuit City -- but it won't save B&M.

Luckily, the vast majority of customers didn't even remember, a month later, that Circuit City had anything to do with DIVX -- perhaps never even knew or cared.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Quick note from the website about their extended warranties:

Are Circuit City's extended warranties affected by the liquidation?
•No. Circuit City Advantage Protection Plans® (extended warranties) have been backed by third-party independent companies for more than 15 years and as a result, are not impacted by Circuit City's closing.
•Currently, all Circuit City Advantage Protection Plans are fully backed by the Assurant Solutions companies. Assurant Solutions operates as Federal Warranty Service Corporation, Sureway, Inc., and United Service Protection, Inc. Assurant Solutions is part of Assurant, Inc. (NYSE: AIZ), and its extended service contacts are backed by an Assurant insurance subsidiary rated A "Excellent" by A.M. Best Co.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Anyone been in this morning? How are the Blu Ray disc prices this morning?

Doug

Re: I'll not miss them

I can still point out the dire moves of a dying corporation. It made sense in one way, but not another. Getting rid of those who know what they are doing is not the best last ditch solution.


No arguments from me. Fine analysis. However, a group of consumers was put out by the DIVX scheme, and for us, it soured CC forever . We may not count as much, but bad will does spread more than good will. Heck, it's a decade later and I am not the only one who remembers.

But you are right in the big scheme of things, who cares.
B&M operations are never going to be the same since the internet came as some sort of great equalizer to the masses.

People sell top each other rather than through stores now, and Amazon and their ilk do a good job with their interests.
Evolution.
Things will get interesting as the governments, both local and Federal really ramp up their interest in taxing internet purchases and otherwise raising the costs to do business here.
B&M's may have some use after all.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I couldn't agree more. I asked the girl at the check out, "could they not possibly turn it down a little". She said it was company policy and that people asked her about the loudness all the time. I do think it has gotten a little less loud in the past year, but its still too loud.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I hate noise pollution. You go into some store and they have whatever music playing, often too loud. And maybe I don't want to hear that music, or maybe when I'm shopping I'd prefer if any music was playing that it was very soft in the background.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

The Circuit City in Burlington MA was mobbed midday today, with about 10 cars lined up on Middlesex Turnpike waiting to turn into the parking lots, the front parking lot (about 20 spots) was completely full, presumably the rear parking lot (about 80 spots) full or close, the front parking lot literally bumper-to-bumper with cars trying to find a stop, and about 25 cars parked on the side street.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I stopped by the local CC while I was out running errands. The store was pretty chaotic and it was actually BUSY. Trust me, that is a word I NEVER use to describe this particular store! The only store discounts that were marked was a couple of hand-drawn "10% off all TVs" signs in that department. Nothing else. I finally tracked down an employee who informed me that all "new release" DVDs and CDs were 10% off and that "library" titles (as he called them) were 20% off. The section looked as ransacked as ever and the selection appeared to be as skimpy as always, so I just turned around and left.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I stopped by the one closest to my house. Parking lot was packed. Consistent flow of people going in and going out -- one thing in common, neither had CC bags. I was told 10% off Blu Ray, that made my trip short. Waste of time.

Doug

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I went to one. They were letting people in in groups, as other people exited, in order to keep the capacity legal. Fortunately the mood was light, and the air temperature was good thanks to the winter air.

There were no signs indicating what percentage off anything might be, so no way to know if you were getting a good deal until you got to the counter.

Plenty of BluRay movies left, because they were all priced $25 and up. It will take a lot to make those prices even comparable to online.

The only real deals appeared to be some items that were already on sale. If they were allowing the sale prices that had been set before they knew they were being liquidated PLUS the discount on top of that, then there were some good deals. I saw a Western Digital 1 Terabyte harddrive for about $130! My housemate had just bought it last week for $200. I didn't need one though, and it was gone a minute later. Small portable hard drives were not priced well.

I saw some Sony 8GB Micro Vault thumb drives for $24 -- probably $22 assuming 10% off.

I think there may be some good deals on digital SLR cameras worth exploring, but I'm not familiar enough with professional cameras to say definitively if that is the case.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Fry's has a 1TB Maxtor on sale this week for $99. I'd be really tempted to get one if I didn't have a 500GB Western Digital sitting here waiting for me to install it.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

My wife and I went in yesterday to look at TV stands for our 42in Sony LCD. They had a black antique stand that was 329 for 30% off. The Denon receiver I had been looking at was 10% off, but not sure if I can do better online.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I agree, Circuit City hasn't been a serious competitor for a couple years now. Best Buy's competition is really Walmart/Target/Amazon.

Circuit City was a very poorly managed company over the past 10 years. Their demise is kind of sad, as they were the first major electronics chain to come to my area, but in recent years I've seldom found anything there that I wanted to buy. Most of the time, I'd browse CC for a few minutes, get frustrated, then leave to spend my money elsewhere. I won't really miss them.

I'm always amazed how people will swarm a liquidating retailer and buy armloads of merchandise at only 10 or 20% discount off MSRP. In general, the regular everyday prices were probably lower than that and no one was buying then.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I wish I could feel worse for Circuit City closing in my area, but the stores near my house, one in Saugus and one in Danvers, had some of the worst employees on their payroll. On more than a few occasions did I go in to purchase a piece of electronic equipment and each time I circled around said department without anyone coming up to ask if I needed help. And if they weren't standing around twiddling their thumbs or talking to other employees, they were off playing Rock Band.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Yeah, their Hanover store was a real piece of work as well.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Seattle (Lynnwood) WA store had 10% off Cameras, video games and video game accessories, 20% off movies (BD & DVD), I don't know about TVs and audio gear. All discounts were off MSRP. Other than Death Race they didn't really have any newer releases on BD.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I got a flyer for Circuit City in today's newspaper, advertising this weeks new releases. Do you think if I brought it to Best Buy, they'd match their prices? I figure they'd have to since techinically, Circuit City isn't closed yet.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Exactly. When the Atlanta stores had their closign "sales" they were a joke. They were nothing more than same deals that could be had somewhere at any given time, but because they had big signs (everywhere) they were packed with people paying new full price.

CC was a disaster, but there needs to be competition.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Remember, the price match policy requires a published advertisement that shows the actual price. (They will not match a percent-off.) And remember that the policy requires that the retailer (Circuit City) has to be willing to answer a telephone call from Best Buy, confirming the price, and availability of the item for sale in your local store.

The price match policy does not turn competitors' ads in the newspaper into anything like "coupons" at Best Buy.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

The CC website does say that all extended warranties are still in effect since they are from a third party so that won't be affected, they are even accepting returns for 14 days from the announcement for items purchased before the announcement. 20% off CD's and DVD's locally today but they don't have much signage up yet.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I think the only one I ever went in that even had the slightest bit of a decent sales help was one in Framingham on Rte. 9. That was about it.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I did find a few really good deals the last weekend on a handful of BluRay's that were left -- most were 70-80% off MRSP though only about 10 titles were left. Nothing super exciting, but I did get 16 Blocks, The Invasion, Space Cowboys, Good Night and Good Luck plus a couple others for what amounted to about $8 a piece after tax. 4th Season of Lost was available for $25 though I didn't need it.

Other than that it was a picked over mess -- a few DVD and CD, some AV furniture, a couple pieces of audio equipment that appeared to have been dropkicked a few times.

I went by a couple other times in December but absolutely nothing appeared to be on sale. Similar to CompUSA, the very last weekend I did find a few odds and ends (some USB and AV cables, Refilled ink cartridges), but nothing useful.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Good call, I didn't think about them calling. I might try anyways; a lot of the staff at my Best Buy are kinda lazy, most barely even look at the ads. I was considering going to Circuit City to see if they had any good deals, but after reading what everybody said, I'm glad I didn't bother!

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

There were signs along the street near where CC is located in Racine with the "Store Closing up to 30% off" (my emphasis)...the parking lot looked like they were giving the stuff away! Their lot was PACKED as was the outer lots for CC's neighbors: Barnes & Nobel, Dick's Sporting Goods and (drum roll, please) Best Buy!

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Yea, everytime I see a Circuit City it is right next to a Best Buy or Ultimate Electronics. I wonder it anyone that wanted a TV moseyed on over the nearest electronics store to check and make sure they were getting a deal?
Sucks that all those people will lose their jobs though.
It's alright, I prefer to shop at Ultimate Electronics anyway. They seem to always have the best prices and most helpful staff.
I will miss 14 dollar new releases though.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

I just bought a Kingston 8GB thumb drive for $16 on Amazon.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

One thing to note about liquidation sales - prices are set by the liquidators, not neccessarily the company going out of business. Those 30% off signs are meant to generate traffic and give the illusion of a bargain. Based on some of the posts above about crowded parking lots and stores, it seems to work.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

Right, it gets a bit misleading at times, but it seems to work.

Re: Circuit City closing all stores -- watch for bargains coming soon

This blows my mind too. By the time it gets to 30% or higher (comparable to online prices) everything is already gone. It's a real shame, how clueless people are.