Circuit City liquidating remaining stores

[Bitek]

CC, I won't miss you

I suspect that nobody's really surprised that Circuit City has finally bitten the dust. The fading electronics chain had been in a death spiral for quite some time, and all the cost-cutting in the world couldn't save it in the end. While a dreadful economy contributed to its downfall, Circuit City's real problem was getting stuck with bad management that ultimately drove the company out of business.
Let's backtrack a bit. Back in March 2007, Circuit City fired more than 3,400 experienced sales people and other staffers simply because they were making too much money. Management then hired inexperienced, lower-paid workers to take their place. Bad move. Really bad move. This short-sighted decision may have looked good to then-CEO Philip Schoonover, who collected a cool multi-million bonus that year for his cost-cutting brilliance, but I'm convinced that it drove shoppers elsewhere. It certainly did in my case. (An aside: The Wall Street Journal named Schoonover the worst CEO of 2008 for his managerial bungling.)
Over the past 18 months, my visits to Circuit City stores in my area weren't a lot of fun, and ultimately I vowed never to shop there again. One time, a few months after the layoffs, I went to a nearby Circuit City to buy a laptop case that had had been featured prominently in the store's newspaper ad that week. But the case wasn't on display and the clueless sales dudes -- who were busy doing something online -- had no idea whether the item was in stock. They weren't too keen on checking the back room or phoning nearby Circuit City stores to check on their stock either. "Uh, you could buy it online, I guess," one of the slackers finally told me. Which I did -- from another retailer. Another time I went to a different Circuit City during the 2007 holiday season. The store was woefully understaffed. Only one register was open, and a long line of irate customers trying to buy stuff snaked around the store. The computer system was down too, but nobody working that day seemed too concerned.
These are anecdotal incidents, I know. But I suspect they weren't uncommon. In my case, they made me not want to shop at Circuit City anymore. The employees weren't rude, mind you, just indifferent. They didn't understand Customer Service 101, and that's management's fault. The unfortunate result is that 34,000 Circuit City employees will soon be out of work.

Pretty much sums up my experience too

 

[Socio]

The Circut City by my house is not even 6 months old yet and they are closing. I went there yesterday and they had up to 30% off, it was a zoo. It was like sea of vultures picking over the stores dead remains.

 

[AndrewR]

I am somewhat sad to see them go, if only for the rare deals I could find and for the competition they offered Best Buy, lackluster as it may have been. However, I am not sorry to see the pathetic morons at my local CC losing their jobs as they were poor excuses for oxygen breathers. I was there a few weeks ago, and there were four people behind the front counter, yet only one register was being used. It took somewhere near 15 minutes to checkout, and I was the third person in line. When I finally got to the counter, the little chickie was texting someone! Unbelievable.

 

[BoberFett]

I stopped in today and things where 10% off their already high prices. I imagine that kind of "sale" is just a small part what caused their troubles to begin with.

There were times when I saw an item in the Sunday ad that I'd stop by for and they wouldn't have any in stock on Sunday afternoon. Either they sold out immediately or they never had the damn product to begin with.

Good riddance.

 

[rudder]

Circuit City is gone.... but how the hell is Radio Shack still in business?

 

[AnitaPeterson]

Originally posted by: GoPackGo
Circuit City hadn't been the same since the DIVX fiasco

WORD!

 

[wwswimming]

i bought an eMachines laptop for $400. it has one of those 15 watt AMD 2650E chips
that runs at 1.6 GHz.

after a full charge, the battery lasts about 2 hours.

 

[Capt Caveman]

Wow, just got an email telling me that my CC rebate check has been mailed out. Hopefully, it won't bounce.

 

[Thump553]

Originally posted by: AnitaPeterson

Originally posted by: GoPackGo
Circuit City hadn't been the same since the DIVX fiasco

WORD!

True, that was a huge step forward on the death spiral. Changing thier compensation system a couple of years ago and letting go nearly all their higher paid sales staff was the final nail-it destroyed employee morale and wrecked customer relations.

Circuit City would make an excellent case study for business schools on how to wreck what was a very successful business.

 

[Balt]

Originally posted by: rudder
Circuit City is gone.... but how the hell is Radio Shack still in business?

My father has always been convinced Radio Shack is a front company for money laundering.

 

[Possessed Freak]

Originally posted by: rudder
Circuit City is gone.... but how the hell is Radio Shack still in business?

Radio Shack is still very useful to me. I can buy components the same day I have need to build yet another A/V adapter I absolutely refuse to pay $50 for at CC!

 

[StageLeft]

Originally posted by: rudder
Circuit City is gone.... but how the hell is Radio Shack still in business?

Even CEO Can't Figure Out How RadioShack Still In Business