Circuit Breaker
EmailDid you shop very much at Circuit City? Did you find yourself alone there? The chain, facing a one-year decline in same-store sales of 13 percent — even before the market tanked — has announced it is closing 155 of its stores, cutting its U.S. workforce 17 percent. The company’s list of stores to be closed is HERE. Going-out-of-business sales start Wednesday.
The company is in enough trouble that its stock has been trading below one dollar a share for the last month — low enough that the New York Stock Exchange threatened to stop listing it. "We deeply regret the impact today’s announcement will have on our associates, our guests and the communities where these stores are located," said James A. Marcum, the company’s acting president and CEO, in a statement. "We truly are grateful to each of our associates for their many contributions to the company." It’s a tragedy to hear yet one more announcement of people losing their jobs, and it will hardly be the last this year. But more than one reporter or business analyst said the chain helped do itself in. Long before the market decline, it laid off many of its sales people on the grounds that they were too highly paid — which is another way of saying they were the most experienced.
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Don’t worry, McCain said he will create jobs, and lower taxes, the last eight years were an illusion, it’s just crazy, more layoffs, thanks for nothing….VOTE OBAMA
Posted by: matt | November 3, 2008, 1:59 pm 1:59 pm
This is GREAT NEWS. In a time when company’s have adopted the atitude that the customer is the enemy, to be treated with disdain and disrespect, it is heartening to see such a company get exactly what it deserves. The CEO of CircuitCity has spent millions trying to analyze why the company was sinking. Somehow, the idea that treating your customers like garbage might not be a good idea apparently was too complicated for them. Can’t wait to see them completely fail.
Posted by: McFarland | November 3, 2008, 7:40 pm 7:40 pm
I called it years ago when I had to “bother” employees who just stood around talking with each other instead of helping customers. You reap what you sowed.
Posted by: Icalledit | November 3, 2008, 8:16 pm 8:16 pm
To bad its not bestbuy going down
Posted by: pewpewmigoo | November 3, 2008, 10:17 pm 10:17 pm
How is this a Science and Technology story?
Posted by: Ernie Mercer | November 3, 2008, 11:29 pm 11:29 pm
I worked for the company for years, until commission rates were cut in half and hours were increased to 60. I left to start my own satellite company and did quite well for the very reasons listed above, poor service from the folks at the store level. A year later, they canned the commission system completely and went to the hourly pay model, loosing the rest of the trained staffing. I saw it coming, too bad, they had a good operation, once!
Posted by: prosalesguy | November 4, 2008, 6:18 am 6:18 am
Same as everyone else. I went to buy a new pc and felt as if I was bothering them to help me so I left and spent my $1300.00 at a local store, bye not sorry to see you go!
Posted by: davy | November 4, 2008, 7:25 am 7:25 am
Big duh. If you treat your customers like dirt, pretty soon or later, your company will tank big time.
Best Buy is the same thing, just I think they’re staying afloat due to having better prices and more items to buy than Circuit City.
And yep, I agree with Ernie Mercer. Why is this in the Science and Technology section? Should this be in the Money section since it deals with a businesses?
Posted by: GWP | November 4, 2008, 7:28 am 7:28 am
Geez, the Circuit City close to where I work is closing down and it just opened about a month ago.
Posted by: Ricardo | November 4, 2008, 10:14 am 10:14 am
Note from Ned Potter–
Ernie and GWP, my apologies if you think this post is in the wrong place. So happens both our Tech and Money sections ran the Circuit City story, and I thought I’d just be writing about…the business of technology.
Posted by: Ned Potter | November 4, 2008, 11:10 am 11:10 am
I worked for Circuit City for seven years. In those seven years I watched the company steadily take the focus from the customer and associate and put it on the higher members of the corporate and management chains. I watched as they fired thousands of quality sales associates because they we’re making more with commission than Circuit City was willing to pay out. Instead they changed to hourly sales associates to help them keep more of the profit for thier corporate offices. I eventually moved on to MUCH greener pastures and left retail altogether. Six weeks after I left, I learned that if I hadn’t, I would have been fired anyway since EVERY associate that made over 8 dollars and hour had been terminated and replaced with “high school” level associates. Its not a wonder their sales went down and their quality of service went down the tubes. They became so busy cutting out their bottom dollar expenses that they forgot that in order to sell high end electronics you have to have STRONG QUALITY SALESPEOPLE. Goodbye Circuit City, you will not be missed.
Posted by: Beentheredonethat | November 4, 2008, 2:32 pm 2:32 pm
I quit shopping at Circuit City years ago. I got fed up with lousy customer service. On my last trip there I left $250 worth of merchandise at the check out stand and gave an employee $2 dollars for the Coke I was drinking after the third time he told me that someone would help me shortly, as he and two other employees just stood there doing nothing.
Posted by: Gary | November 4, 2008, 3:53 pm 3:53 pm
Circuit City was my place to go for electronics.. in the 1980s. I got my first boombox there, got my 5 1/4 disks for my C64 there, and my first Yamaha keyboard (PSR-510). The problem was that over time I “forgot” Circuit City and went to Best Buy or got online for my electronics habit. It seems others had a “short circuit” as well and went elsewhere for their merchandise. Circuit City was unable to change with the times.
Posted by: Carson | November 4, 2008, 11:41 pm 11:41 pm
Circuit city’s closings are not a surprise to me it is ashamed that people will be losing their jobs but every time ive been shopping there ive felt like i was bothering them just to spend my hard earned money and when i told the associate about my wait for their help he actually seemed like he was mad
Posted by: Vince | November 5, 2008, 10:59 am 10:59 am
Yep – I stopped going too, customer service was just awful.
Posted by: Jeff | November 5, 2008, 5:38 pm 5:38 pm
Do not buy anything at Circuit City that offers a rebate, because you may never get the rebate. Almost two years ago, I bought SanDisk CompactFlash memory cards with a rebate of $25 each for a total of $150. I followed instructions and even called several times, but I never got the rebates. The people who answer the phones, if you can get someone to answer (only part of the time do they answer), were no help as they have a script they follow and may be in Buenos Aries, Argentina. I also had to go to three stores to get the memory cards. I bought them online, but had to pick them up, and one store did NOT have the items, so they had to refund my money and I had to go to another store farther out. Thanks for reading this.
Posted by: Aloha jon | November 5, 2008, 10:49 pm 10:49 pm
Did it occur to anyone that the reason many of us stopped shopping at Circuit City is because of their limited product lines and poor return policies?
Posted by: Quietman | November 26, 2008, 12:44 pm 12:44 pm
ps
I agree with the other comments as well. The help know nothing about the products, which use standard components and which are proprietary, what is compatible with what and so forth. Comp USA and Staples are much better at this. Best Buy is better than CC but they have service and return issues.
Posted by: Quietman | November 26, 2008, 12:53 pm 12:53 pm