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Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

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Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#51

Post by RcouF1uZ4gsC »

What is interesting, for me, I prefer to buy big ticket items such as TV’s and computers from a physical store. With Amazon, I am worried about getting an counterfeit. Even with other online stores, I worry about how it will be shipped and will porch thieves steal it, and will it be delayed.

With a physical store, I can go it, check out a model myself to see how it really feels to me, and walk out the store with my purchase.

With Frys no longer around, I am now limited mainly to Best Buy and Costco.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#52

Post by jonathankoren »

someperson wrote: post #41
dlevine wrote: post #5

I remember going to Fry's for the first time in the late 90s. Having grown up on the East Coast, I had only heard about this magical place where you could buy pretty much anything computer-related. It was truly an experience, especially when compared with from CompUSA and Best Buy. When I moved to the Bay Area, I did enjoy going to Fry's and walking around ogling the hardware. Over time, I switched pretty much to buy…

In the Bay Area do people often bring dogs into retail stores?

All the time.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#53

Post by mc32 »

bigmattystyles wrote: post #42
mc32 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Cavernous Apropos, didn't the one in Sunnyvale become an REI?

Sports Basement - they kept the enter key on the door though. To be fair when Fry's left that building, it's because they built a bigger one down the street, the one with the sinc function as a logo. It was a glorious experience in the 90s.

> they kept the enter key on the door though

That's a nice touch/nod!

Thanks for the correction, yeah SportsBasement. I went mostly to the one off Portage.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#54

Post by jonathankoren »

When I moved to California in the early 2000s, i made my trip to Fry’s, but it was kind of disappointing, although I have no idea what I was expecting. I will say that Fry’s was the only nonsexshop I’ve ever been in that sold hardcore pornography DVDs. I always wondered how many they actually sold.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#55

Post by strawBarry »

My uncle used to care for Donald Fry (started Fry's original supermarket) at his mansion in Arizona. We got to visit and hang out with him and his wife. The place was a palace. And yet two of the nicest, down-to-earth people I ever met. They insisted on us staying the night and fixing us breakfast in the morning. This was a couple years before he passed, and he was already suffering from Parkinson's, but I'll always remember how sweet they were, and nothing like I expected.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#56

Post by mc32 »

someperson wrote: post #41
dlevine wrote: post #5

I remember going to Fry's for the first time in the late 90s. Having grown up on the East Coast, I had only heard about this magical place where you could buy pretty much anything computer-related. It was truly an experience, especially when compared with from CompUSA and Best Buy. When I moved to the Bay Area, I did enjoy going to Fry's and walking around ogling the hardware. Over time, I switched pretty much to buy…

In the Bay Area do people often bring dogs into retail stores?

They used to bring their pets to the office too till the people with allergies put an end to that.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#57

Post by Stratoscope »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #31
BuyMyBitcoins wrote: post #3

I’m not surprised, but this makes me feel incredibly sad. I built my first PC using parts from there. I’m going to miss it. But once Fry’s pivoted to be a consignment store that was mostly empty and selling pallets of bottled water and perfume, it was obvious the business was about to die. Curiously, Microcenter has managed to live on and seems fairly robust. I can’t help but think Fry’s tried to sell too many differ…

What mystified me was how they thought the consignment shift would pan out, and didn't immediately reverse course when it didn't: Fry's was always heavily trafficked with people purchasing there every time I was there prior to the consignment shift.

The consignment model was because they didn't have any money to pay suppliers for merchandise. So it was something of a choice between having nearly empty shelves and completely empty shelves.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#58

Post by mc32 »

ethbr0 wrote: post #45
noncoml wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Central Computer is still kicking around -for now. I used to be a big fun of them. But their markup + must be a bundle, buy 3 more items rule for RTX30x0 cards, really put me off.

GPUs were always the dumbest possible products for brick and mortar. Extremely limited customer base, fast tech iteration cycle, and inflexible margins.

CPUs and RAM used to go up and down weekly at least in the grey market "distributor" segment. Fry's and Central, etc, had enough markup they didn't have to worry too much about that. Also, I think Central and other smaller ones were more JIT for low margin products with unstable pricing (they'd have daily deliveries from their grey market distributors).

But surprisingly, GPUs hold their value these days.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#59

Post by ogre_codes »

Fry’s was a junkyard for years, I’m not even sure how they lasted as long as they did. Playing the “Is this a returned item” game every time you went to buy something was never much fun.

I did get a few great deals there, but it seemed like a long ugly slide into oblivion and I haven’t wanted to go in there for years.

Re: Fry's Electronics is closing all stores

#60

Post by [deleted] »

someperson wrote: post #41
dlevine wrote: post #5

I remember going to Fry's for the first time in the late 90s. Having grown up on the East Coast, I had only heard about this magical place where you could buy pretty much anything computer-related. It was truly an experience, especially when compared with from CompUSA and Best Buy. When I moved to the Bay Area, I did enjoy going to Fry's and walking around ogling the hardware. Over time, I switched pretty much to buy…

In the Bay Area do people often bring dogs into retail stores?

[deleted]
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