Warm/YMMV: Radio Shack liquidation now up to 90% off

[Mike64]

Radio Shack's liquidation seems to have entered it's final "phase E". It's still not worth a long trip to a store. And even when available, less-discounted, bigger ticket items still aren't worth it IMO. But things like batteries and discrete components/"DIY parts" are now 90% off and they've pulled every last box and bag out of the basement. They're not moving liquidation inventory around at all, so stock varies wildly from store to store.

Compared to online prices, even -90% isn't the deal of the decade, and you might have to rummage through random boxes of baggies instead of nice, neat drawers, but if you want to replenish your junk drawer or something, it might be worth a look. Yesterday I picked up a bunch of SR44 button cells for 40¢ 60¢ each, and some LEDs, heat sinks, audio connectors, etc. for 20-25¢/pkg. One local store still has a fair number of less popular Li button cells, though another had barely any left at all. One still has lots of cordless phone batteries too, if anyone's still using those...

Oh, and yesterday I overheard that another 100+ stores were recently slated to liquidate and close, so if yours wasn't already closing, but also isn't in a "prime" location, you might want to check it out.

 

[Freejack2]

If you can catch a store on the last day towards closing time, you can get some amazing deals.
The deal at my local store was $10 for whatever you could fit in a bag.
I got a couple hundred dollars worth of stuff for about $25. If the liquidator is the same for your stores, they should do the same thing.

 

[Mike64]

If you can catch a store on the last day towards closing time, you can get some amazing deals.
The deal at my local store was $10 for whatever you could fit in a bag.

I'll keep that in mind, but at the stores I've been to here in NYC, I'm not sure there'll be a couple of hundred bucks worth of anything left in them by closing day! I guess fewer people than I would've thought regularly shop online? A lot of them were buying stuff even earlier on, at lower discounts, that I didn't think was worth touching...

 

[DPOverLord]

I'll keep that in mind, but at the stores I've been to here in NYC, I'm not sure there'll be a couple of hundred bucks worth of anything left in them by closing day! I guess fewer people than I would've thought regularly shop online? A lot of them were buying stuff even earlier on, at lower discounts, that I didn't think was worth touching...

I am here too went to 68th and lex and they are good for business and not closing. Whats worth getting then?

 

[Mike64]

I am here too went to 68th and lex and they are good for business and not closing. Whats worth getting then?

Not all the stores are closing. At the stores that aren't closing, there are no liquidation sales, just business as usual. Imo, nothing is normally worth buying at Radio Shack unless you're desperate: you can't find it anywhere else and can't wait for delivery when buying online. Otherwise, ou're pretty much guaranteed to find anything they sell somewhere else for less money, probably better made, and sold by people who know more about their product than RS clerks. For the last several years, they mostly didn't seem to know anything about anything they were selling at all, except maybe a little about cell phones. And the occasional millenial who knew the ABCs of hooking up a Roku. The company didn't go bankrupt for no reason. (sigh)

I don't know if any of the NYC liquidating stores are still open - the store closest to me here in south Brooklyn closed for good last Friday. As it was, even after pawing through hundreds of little baggies tossed haphazardly into big boxes, I didn't find much worth buying even at 90% off. Just some random small stuff: a few batteries @ 60¢ ea, some switches, discrete components & a few ICs, a nice anti-static wrist strap for 90¢, 100 ft of CCA speaker wire for $4. Stuff like that. Nothing to lose sleep over if you missed it. Frankly, if I didn't have fond memories of the place from the 1970s, I probably would've skipped it altogether...