[NJARC] Closing, A Store Near You

[Peter Markavage]

Saturday's, at the Lafayette store in Plainfield during the 60's, always
seem to be a community gathering of "radio-types". During the late 50's
and early 60's, Federated Purchaser in Mountainside also had gatherings
(ham hangout)  on Saturdays.

Pete, wa2cwa

On Wed, 22 Feb 2006 11:56:15 -0800 (PST) john ruccolo <jr6v6gt at yahoo.com>
writes:
> Visit our web site - See http://www.njarc.org
> _______________________________________________
> NJARC Reflectorites,
> 
> I've really enjoyed this thread regarding the Radio
> Shack restructuring. Let me tell you a couple of
> little stories....Please forgive a quick trip down
> Memory Lane....
> 
> 1) I worked at a mall Radio Shack summer of 1978 while
> in college. MAN, have things changed since then! We
> still sold tubes and 450V electrolytic caps, although
> demand was already way down. We had the TRS-80
> computer (I believe it was introduced Spring '78),
> which we actually sold a few of -- to schools, mostly.
> Of course, CB radios and police scanners were BIG. I
> sold lots of scanners; I seemed to have a knack for
> selling them.
> 
> 2) About 4 or 5 years ago, I went into the Freehold
> Mall Radio Shack while Christmas shopping. I spotted a
> 10-pack of 1N34A diodes and decided that I just had to
> have it. The kid who rang up the sale was pi$$ed! I
> guess I was taking away from his time selling cell
> phones, PCs and laptops, and satellite TV. No "thank
> you," no nothing.
> 
> Bottom Line: the hard-core radio/electronics geek
> (read: hobbyist) community is a very, VERY SMALL
> community compared to the consumer electronics
> industry as a whole. Radio Shack needs to get OUT of
> the parts and specialty electronics business
> (components, test equipment, ham equip., etc.). They
> haven't been very good at that segment of the market
> for years, anyway.
> 
> Yes, they should still sell a few shortwave portables,
> maybe a DVM or two, and a battery tester. But that's
> about IT. They should ONLY stock phone/cable TV/home
> audio/computer cables and accessories. No resistors,
> caps, semiconductors, coils, etc. Most of us can do
> better on the internet or at hamfests or
> computerfests.
> 
> The Manual Man is right on: there's NO WAY a Mall
> Radio Shack, with their tremendous overhead, will
> survive if they try to cater to the specialty
> electronics hobbyists (both modern and vintage). There
> are just not enough of us out there, compared to all
> the folks who want cell phones, big-screen TVs,
> satellite TV, computers, surround-sound audio, etc.
> 
> I think we all miss the days of having a local
> electronics parts store where you could go on a cold,
> rainy Saturday afternoon for that 30/50 MFD/150V cap.
> Ahhh, well....time marches on!
> 
> I enjooyed my little monologue, even if I didn't say
> much! ;-)
> 
> Regards,
> 
> John