8mm Forum: So Long Radio Shack!

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Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on March 08, 2015, 04:46 PM:

They’ve closed our Radio Shack!

(-and a lot of the rest of them too…)

I’ll have to admit, as personal tragedies go, this is pretty light-duty stuff, but it does mean something to me. I’ve been messing around in electronics pretty steadily since I was in elementary school. It was just batteries and bulbs at first. As I got older I got technical instruction in high school, then engineering college then years out in industry. I started out as a hobbyist, but later it was just my job. These past few years I’ve started to build circuitry at home for myself again: a lot of it because of collecting film.

It’s a strange kind of loss when somebody closes your parts store: Nobody understands! I say to my wife “What am I supposed to do if I need an op-amp or a transistor?” She says “……what?”

(Full disclosure: I don’t understand her stuff either! “Exfoliant? Don’t you need your ‘foliants’?”)

There’s a bigger meaning here too. A big part of what’s up here is a decline of hobbies in general. There was a time when people built things in their spare time just for the satisfaction. That guy drilling your molar went to dental school (You certainly hope he did…), but when he got home he be might be building a model ship after dinner (Dentists have the best small tools!). Your accountant might be halfway through a Heathkit ham radio: in a year he’d have his antenna on the roof and be talking to somebody else’s accountant an ocean away. People had dark rooms and wood shops, sewing machines and engine hoists: all for the joy of it.

This is healthy stuff: something that you can accomplish that comes with the burst of endorphins we all need when things go right, yet without the deadlines and the stress the same things would have if they became jobs. (Why I stopped doing electronics at home for twenty years…)

Hobbies aren’t dead: there are still basements with trains in them. Oils are still being applied to canvasses in parks. I even know a couple of people running little movie theaters in their homes.

-They just aren’t as big as they once were.

It's as if we are leading such a fast paced, 24 hour a day lifestyle It’s really hard for somebody to slow down and take the time to carve a wooden bird or learn to make stained glass.

-to me that’s a shame!

P.S. Don’t be too concerned about me getting my wires, switches , resistors, plugs, jacks and more exotic stuff…there’s still internet!

Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on March 08, 2015, 04:50 PM:

Tandy as they were called here in the UK Steve, all closed down many many years ago sadly. This is very sad news indeed in your home town Steve. I don't believe people play around fixing things these days Steve in the manner we did as kids and indeed are still doing to this very day.

It has become a very dumb down throw away world sadly.
If I ever try to teach anybody aged 19 to 25 be it at home or even in work how things actually work....they just appear totally uninterested and I don't believe myself to be that bad a person to learn from where all things engineering are concerned.

I truly connect with your every sentiment on this Steve,I was totally fascinated visiting Tandy's as a kid.
Anything that "works" all by itself has always caught my imagination and you are so so correct about today's pace of life, it is simply relentless and doesn't give anything to a person's creativity while ever we have to compete with the speed of a computer and the energies of a robot!

Maybe we created our own downfall as mere human beings!

Posted by Brian Fretwell (Member # 4302) on March 08, 2015, 04:56 PM:

Yes, we still have Maplin in the UK, but they are much more general nowadays and push finished goods.
Mind you they sell A1/259 lamps at a reasonable price.

Posted by Clay Smith (Member # 4122) on March 08, 2015, 05:50 PM:

A couple of weeks ago I asked the manager of our local Radio Shack in Albany (CA) if they were part of the downsizing and he emphatically said no. But I fear that may not be the case for long. Very well said Steve.

Posted by Guy Taylor, Jr. (Member # 786) on March 08, 2015, 07:34 PM:

I hate to see this. I love Radio Shack. I will always be a "brick and mortar" supporter when it comes to retail.

Posted by Joe Vannicola (Member # 4156) on March 08, 2015, 09:47 PM:

I liked Radio Shack when they sold Tandy products, before selling out to another company. In the seventies, I looked forward to getting the Radio Shack catalog and reading the President of the company's Flyerside Chats as they were called. It gave the company a face, so to speak, instead of being a faceless corporate entity.

Posted by Graham Ritchie (Member # 559) on March 09, 2015, 02:08 AM:

I guess a lot of hobbies, are also in decline due to the older age group that support many of them are now simply dying off.

I agree we are moving way to quick, I remember when I came to NZ everything was shut in the weekends except a dairy. People had the weekends off, to enjoy time spent with there families, to go fishing, camping, all that kind of stuff. Now that's all gone, the shops are open every day, people working all hours just to pay the bills. Finding the time for hobbies is just not there anymore...the world has gone nuts.

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on March 09, 2015, 03:22 AM:

Further to Brian's comment about Maplins.
Note that their A1/259 lamps have a round end where the pins are, and as such, they do not fit in some projectors which have a slot-in lamp holder. These require lamps which have a rectangular end.

Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on March 09, 2015, 03:32 AM:

Very valid point raised there Maurice.

I only ever buy Osram lamps so I have no experience with Maplins for lamps, though I have used them for other items occasionally.

Posted by Dave Groves (Member # 4685) on March 09, 2015, 04:54 AM:

It isn't only hobbies that are suffering. Fewer folk cook anything these days. When I tell folk my wife makes rice puddings and I make Yorkshire puddings every Sunday they want to come for lunch. It's all instant everything. We have little patience anymore and you can't build a boat without it.

Posted by David Ollerearnshaw (Member # 3296) on March 09, 2015, 06:49 AM:

The MTV thing, everythings fast cut. I remember Tandy here in the UK. Also Maplins before they had shops were mail order, from I think Southend on Sea I could ring them on Monday and most times it came next day.

After my problems last year I try to chill out more. Hoping to get started with my 8 year old son the model railway setup.

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on March 09, 2015, 09:21 AM:

Carpe Dium, David!

My son is 12 and I've been saying that since he was about 5!

(I mean it every time I say it, too!)

We fight the thing with cooking in my house too. My wife makes an effort to have a really nice home cooked dinner every Sunday night. We turn all the screens and speakers off, we sit down at the table together, and we enjoy it.

I have this tiny coffee pot I use to heat water when we go hiking. It has the basket and stem in it, so just for laughs I tried using it to percolate coffee a couple of weeks ago. It's much more of a process than the Keurig, but the coffee is great!

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on March 09, 2015, 12:13 PM:

I miss them too. I used to hang out in the store all the time when I was growing up, (I've ALWAYS been a tech geek, so to speak, understanding little, but admiring it, just the same).

It's kind of like what is happening with Sears and Montgomery Ward. That used to be the neat thing, ordering something especially for you from a catalog from all over the world.

Now you can do it with a click of the mouse over the internet.

Sigh, I just miss those earlier ... simpler days.

Posted by John Hourigan (Member # 111) on March 09, 2015, 02:23 PM:

I used to eagerly await Radio Shack's new catalog each year during the 1970s. Radio Shack had a good run, dating back to its founding in 1921. But time marches on -- and thank goodness. While it's nice to occasionally (the operative word being "occasionally") look back on the days of yore, I wouldn't trade the convenience and vast selection available today that the Internet affords from the comfort of one's own home.

Posted by Alan Rik (Member # 73) on March 09, 2015, 03:11 PM:

I used to like the Radio Shack stores when they had knowledgeable people working them. I would go in and ask them for some LED's and they would ask what I was going to use them for. I would tell them to light up a model airplane or whatever and they pointed me in the right direction. The last time I went in I asked the salesperson if they had any heat sink paste for computer repair.
The salesperson pointed me to the back of the store and said, "Yo. If we have it, its back there."

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on March 09, 2015, 03:40 PM:

You were lucky to find knowledgable people there.

I walked into a big 'shack one time and asked the manager if they stocked power transistors.

He said:

"No, but we got radio-control poodles."

The trouble I ran into is that things became more digital based even the more knowledgeable people knew cell phones and tablets, and had no clue about all the weird stuff with wires poking out in the drawers at the back of the store.

I brought in a DIN loudspeaker plug not too long after I got my first sound machine and asked if they had them. The guy behind the counter had never seen such a thing. This at a store that was all about audio at one time.

They were still useful: you just needed to be able to work the catalog and later the website.

Any Alumni of the Battery Club here? What a club: no meetings, no dues, just batteries!

Posted by Dominique De Bast (Member # 3798) on March 09, 2015, 04:51 PM:

Wa had also Tandy stores in Belgium until the American company decided in 1993 to leave Europe (except UK). You're Lucky in the US to have had Radio Shack until 2015.

Posted by Bryan Chernick (Member # 1998) on March 09, 2015, 06:38 PM:

quote:
Any Alumni of the Battery Club here? What a club: no meetings, no dues, just batteries!

I was in the battery club, we missed you at the meetings [Smile]

I think Radio Shack died when they diminished the electrical components to a few drawers in the back and started concentrating on "radio-control poodles" and cell phones. The internet is a much better market for electrical components, you just have to wait for it to be shipped. I wonder when they sold their last vacuum tube?

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on March 09, 2015, 09:04 PM:

I bet if I dig through the stuff I brought here when we got married I'd find the membership card!

I think Radio Shack found its moment during the citizen's band radio craze in the mid-late 1970s. You'd go there and they had all the stuff: mobile radios, base stations, cabling, antennas.

-Yet I bought a new car in 1988 and the thought of putting a CB in there never occurred.

My big supplier these days is Digikey. It's true: I order the stuff and it's here in just a few days. There's just certain things like project boxes you really need to see first hand because The drawings aren't detailed enough, and there's always some 1K resistor that becomes 4.7K after you've tested the thing you've built.

-It's nice to have a parts pusher 10 minutes away!

[ March 09, 2015, 10:34 PM: Message edited by: Steve Klare ]

Posted by Michael De Angelis (Member # 91) on March 10, 2015, 12:01 AM:

quote:
People had dark rooms and wood shops, sewing machines and engine hoists: all for the joy of it.

Very true. My sister bought fabric and patterns to make clothes. She made me a jacket, and a pair of pants, and I built her a Grandfather Clock as a gift.

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on March 10, 2015, 07:01 AM:

Just look around. Everywhere you go today, restaurants, movie theaters, shopping malls, airlines, ships, everybody are slaves to their smart phones. They are literally addicted to these devices to the extent that there is no space for anything else, such as hobbies, in their lives.
As Grahame says, the whole world has gone crazy.

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on March 10, 2015, 08:07 AM:

The thing I see that young people are doing is that they still do creative things, but they do it within the boundaries of software. This is constrained creativity: they can't ever exceed the original intent of the software designers.

Even Lego comes with instructions these days!

Following a set of instructions is a critical skill, but the world also needs people that can think outside the box: create things that started between their own two ears and maybe think of ways of doing things that didn't exist before they showed up.

The world also needs people that can do something, fail miserably at it, learn from their mistakes and fix them, and be wiser next time. That's how progress is made.

That kid down the street that put a radio controlled plane through your picture window isn't just building model planes, but developing a mind capable of causing, and then solving problems.

It's better than the kid who builds the thing on a screen that can't self detonate, who is never stuck to take it apart and figure out what went wrong.

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on March 10, 2015, 02:08 PM:

" Radio Controlled Poodles "

I don't know why, but I find that hilarious!

I remember as a kid eagerly awaiting the Sears Christmas catalog, as a good one third of the catalog was just toys, and I would spend hours looking at all the stuff we couldn't afford, but it was fun to imagine!

Posted by Trevor Adams (Member # 42) on March 10, 2015, 02:43 PM:

We used to buy our "xmas hamper" from Sears-even when we lived on Waiheke Island in the Hauraki Gulf.Example-A big box containing,a Daisy model 300 BB rifle,a toy sewing machine,a whole farmyard built into a suitcase,a new set of cutlery and a candy floss machine!!! Great catalogs,great days.Think I was always a mail order devotee-evidenced by my Cineflash and DUX toy projectors from the 1940s...........At one time,Johnson Smith would mail a Keystone hand-crank projector,in it's steel case,to New Zealand-no postal cost!Of course it took 3 months to get here on some tramp steamer! [Wink]

Posted by Graham Ritchie (Member # 559) on March 10, 2015, 05:31 PM:

I remember a small electrical business that was once across the road from the cinema, that guy could fix anything TVs, computer , stereos.... anything. However in todays world, so much stuff does not get repaired "its not worth it" but rather replaced. So where does that leave that skilled tech guy, who is trying to make a living out of it? Once upon a time his skills were highly sought after but not anymore....sad really.

In the end he could not afford the rent as his margin to make a profit was declining...so he closed. The same goes for a camera shop in the paper today, that after 36 years in the business is also closing, as most folk now take photos on the phones then onto there computer etc. So that seems to be another type of business that's in decline.
I agree with Paul, people are addicted to all this stuff, you do see it everywhere.

Posted by Joe Taffis (Member # 4) on March 10, 2015, 07:59 PM:

Good thing us smart folks aren't addicted to technology. We just post here on the good old fashioned 8mm Forum [Wink]

Posted by Douglas Warren (Member # 1047) on March 11, 2015, 01:27 AM:

I too remember the "glory days" of Radio Shack back in the 1970's and 1980's.I had several of the battery club cards over the years.As a teenager in the 70's I bought one of their "150 in One" Electronic Kits.Those things were a blast and I bought one of the modern equivalents a few years ago.The last time I was in a Radio Shack it was a very sad shadow of it's former self.If they survive another 2 years I'll be surprised.
On the topic of hobbies,I've been building plastic models off and on since age five (1967.) Growing up back then almost every boy you'd meet had built a few models in his spare time. Now,it's very much an adult's hobby with that demographic aging rapidly.I doubt few kids today would have much interest (or the patience) to sit down for a few hours and build a model kit.Mom and Pop hobby shops have been dying off for years.Changing times,for better or worse I suppose depending upon your viewpoint.One last word on Radio Shack,here's a link to a site that has a ton of their catalogs (1939-2005) for viewing online:
Radio Shack Catalogs

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on March 11, 2015, 07:59 AM:

I was in our local Cracker Barrel recently for breakfast, and out in the store area they had some plastic Western cowboy scenic sets for sale. I was admiring them, nothing expensive but lots of plastic figures of cowboys on horses, wagons, jail houses, banks etc. The clerk saw me looking at them and came over, and I said how well done they were and how I would have loved such a play set as a child. He said "We can't give them away, there is just no interest by today's kids in toys of that kind, its all push button stuff". We talked for a while about how sad it is that things have changed that much for the worse, and what today's kids are really missing in being so absorbed in video games and find no joy playing with toy soldiers and cowboy sets.

Posted by Douglas Warren (Member # 1047) on March 11, 2015, 09:47 AM:

Paul,
That is so sad to hear but again not surprising.One of my favorite toys as a young boy was the Marx Toys Play Sets.My Army one,Boot Camp provided many hours of fun playtime as did others.A few years ago I was in a upscale toy store with my wife (she was friends with one of the employees) and I spotted a bag of toy soldiers.It had dust on it and appeared to have been there for awhile.I wound up buying them as a nostalgic reminder of a more innocent time.
Douglas

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on October 07, 2017, 10:54 PM:

Back from the Dead!

So we grabbed a little Saturday breakfast this morning. Unexpectedly we found the Radio Shack open for business a few doors down, where we thought there should be nothing but a vacant storefront. I'd heard they would all be gone by June!

We went in and the owner said we were standing on the only operating 'shack on Long Island, where there used to be easily a hundred. I asked him how long they intend to be thee and he said Radio Shack is coming out of bankruptcy and he plans on being there indefinitely.

The thing is they still have a lot of excess inventory to clear out from the other stores. I picked up a $75 HDMI cable for $21. If you have one of these now rare stores close by, you can find some nice goodies for cheap!

What's great for me is if I'm building something and I find out I need a part, maybe I can get it there and recover in hours, not days or weeks.

Posted by Michael De Angelis (Member # 91) on October 08, 2017, 12:50 AM:

Steve,

Interesting news. I keep receiving email notices of their online items at blow-out prices.

I need tuner cleaner. Where's that location on L.I.? It looks like Franklin Sq.

I passed the Garden City Park Store location, and there's a yellow banner: SPRINT Phone Store covering the dirty shadowed outline of the once red colored radio shack store sign , and I'm reminiscing about the past because it's sad, Not FAIR!

Do they still sell the breadboards to tinker with electronics?

Can't wait for the come-back, the store is a favorite of mine.
[Smile]

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on October 08, 2017, 03:46 AM:

Hey Mike,

This sole survivor is on 25A in Northport.

It is fully stocked and all in order. It felt like some kind of time warp finding it there!

The electronic component section seems ready for business too: I'm sure I'll be exploring it some more!

Posted by Richard C Patchett (Member # 974) on October 08, 2017, 08:46 AM:

Greetings
Anyone remember the batters that were red ?
I Have 2 D batteries still in the original wrapper
and still have my Radio shack Credit card.(last month)
I was informed that if i didn't use it within 30 days my account would be closed Well the stores closed in Michigan (USA) about 2 years ago

Posted by Alan Rik (Member # 73) on October 08, 2017, 10:44 AM:

Like a phoenix rising from the ashes! Well the same thing will happen if they keep doing the same thing which is hiring non technical customer service agents who do not know what they are selling and seem to have no desire to want to learn.
The last time I went in I was looking for an LED. I asked the 2 guys working, (one man and the other was a teen or in their 20's?) where they kept them. They both looked at me and said, "Yo whats an LBD?" I said "LED. The little bulbs? You know they are sometimes RED, White, etc?" The older guy said, "If we had them shits in, they might be over there near the cell phones". I went there just knowing they wouldn't be there...of course they weren't. Then they handed me their catalog and they said I could special order them. I said no I can do that for much cheaper on Ebay. So I walked around and found them. I showed it to them and the reply was: "Yo. Thats what you was looking for? Yeah..my bad..my bad..". Uggh. When I was a kid... they all new about the parts they were selling or at least tried. I haven't been back since and that was over 2 years ago.

Posted by Joe Caruso (Member # 11) on October 08, 2017, 01:28 PM:

Steve, I hope you got in on any discout close-outs, including store paraphrenalia (acrylic displays and such) - That's what I did over at a recently-closed camera store - Found reels and cans in storage, splicetapes and display materials that come in handy - Alas, no film - Hobbies will always have a select market area nowadays; Hobby-Lobby brought back the model-kit making fun, even that is now relegated to shows like Chiller-Theatre - - We must press on - Shorty

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on October 08, 2017, 01:47 PM:

The prices are very good, but I think as they burn off their excess inventory they will recover to normal.

Right now I'm trying to get some usable length cables so I can have some flexibility setting up my VP.

I told the guy running the store what I was doing and he repeated in some kind of amazement:

"Video....PROJECTOR?"

-apparently even when I go modern, I'm still out on the fringe!

(I wouldn't begin to mention the small fleet of film projectors and miles of movie film!)

Posted by Michael De Angelis (Member # 91) on October 08, 2017, 03:10 PM:

Steve,

Thanks for the info.

I had the same experience about "fringe" topics.

I received an email for Radio Shack, asking where to find a location near you, and I entered our zip code and another location popped up in Yonkers, who knows what exists in that store?

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on October 08, 2017, 03:22 PM:

I'm thinking you will find what I did yesterday.

These searches never understand what life living on an island is like!

Someone near and dear is currently looking for a job and the job search keeps finding openings in Norwalk, Connecticut.

-sure it's only 20 miles as the crow flies, but there is salt water several hundred feet deep in-between!

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on October 08, 2017, 08:25 PM:

The guy at the checkout at my local CVS store looks just like Steve. I almost asked him tonight about Cinesea! [Big Grin]

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