8mm Forum: Jessops in Administration

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Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on January 09, 2013, 10:14 AM:

It was announced today that British photo retailer, Jessops, has gone into administration.

Founded in Leicester in 1935, they are a familiar name on our High Streets.

Their problem has partly been due to a drop in digital camera sales now that most people use their mobile phones for taking photographs.

The first casualty of 2013.

Posted by Colin Robert Hunt (Member # 433) on January 09, 2013, 03:05 PM:

Also they are only in Name. HSBC owned the dept and bailed them out a few years ago after previous problems with money. Sad fact the mobile phone replaces the DLSR camera. Plus Jessops re[lied on photo printing by 50% to keep there shops running.

Posted by Tom Photiou (Member # 130) on January 09, 2013, 03:14 PM:

All very sad, scilly thing is with todays people and there mobile phones is, they all take hundruds of picture, then say hehe look at this picture and rarley print them out into albums, at best they sit on the phone or a PC.The Plymouth branch of Jessops was Frampton camera's years ago which is where our hobby started for us, my Brother bought his first sound projector in there, a Eumig Mark S810D Lux and a 400ft cut down of stagecoach [Frown]

Posted by John Davis (Member # 1184) on January 09, 2013, 05:02 PM:

Look at 500px and check the spec of the gear used to shoot the stills, hardly any mobile phones feature although in theory they should be capable.
The photographic world has polarised into people who want full creative control and shoot the best quality they can and people who can't be bothered and will happily shoot with a 'camera' they keep in their pocket and has a mediocre lens that has been scratched a hundred times by the car keys.
Guess which product shifts by the bucket-load?

Posted by Rob Young. (Member # 131) on January 09, 2013, 05:28 PM:

Sad for all the employees.

I've been in business 16 years since I left college; never worked for anyone else but me.

Finished my A-Levels and worked for a company 2 years when I was 17-19 years old. On a pittance. Because I loved what I was selling, the people and the company.

Went to University for 5 years and then self-employed myself.

I've loved, and, hated every day of it.

Every day since, I go to sleep worrying over money...every day since, I wake up worrying over money. But everyday, I also thank goodness that I'm worrying over MY money (or lack of it!) not working like a dog to fund someone else.

How a company like this can go bust is a disgrace. A disgrace.

With that amount of capitol and business personale, how a business like this can fold is beyond me.

Actually, no it isn't. The management fleet will fly the coop and be gainfully employed by equally lack-lustre companies on reasonable salaries and be provided with 2.0 litre diesel company cars, while the undertrained work force, who never really had a hope in hell will be on the heap aged 17-25.

If they are lucky, they will find another retail job and maybe, if they are in the top 135 Mensa, eventually find themselves, aged 35-40, driving a 2.0 litre diesel company car with absolutely no quarantee of any sort of pension, or employment for the next...week.

I have to re-invent myself every week to stay afloat.

How a company this size, with the rescouces available, cannot find a way forward is pure laziness.

But then, I suspect, the people who laxed are not the teenagers trying to sell digital cameras at twice the price that they are on the internet, but those who sold the business and swanned off on their yauchts...telling themselves that they worked REALLY HARD to build up a business that some other worthless **** wanted to buy.

Rant over... [Wink]

EDIT: That sounds really pessimistic reading it back, but I guess what I really mean is that if a big company like this can say bye-bye, then let it go...and give some real chance to the entrepreneurs of today.

Posted by Ken Finch (Member # 2768) on January 12, 2013, 01:45 PM:

Hi, went to Canterbury today, both Jessop shops appear to have been closed. I feel sorry for the staff as they appear to have been given very little notice. I do not think there are any other photographic specialist chain of shops now left in the u.k. high streets or shopping malls. I always found the staff knowledgeable about the products they sold which is seldom the case with the remaining "multi product" stores. Sadly, people like us with so called "minority interests" are increasingly neglected in this modern technological world. We are living in an increasing "throw away society" where virtualy anything you purchase is obsolete as soon as you leave the shop, nothing is economically repairable after the guarantee period has expired. In addition, with regard to audio and visual products, the format changes so rapidly that you get left with the "software" and no hardware to use it on. This does nothing to encourage anyone to develop an ongoing interest in photography or movie making. Sorry about ranting on, but who in the present climate can afford to be continually replacing equipment in orsder to continue pursuing our hobbies. Ken Finch.

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on January 12, 2013, 03:01 PM:

Ken
I totally agree with your comments.
All 187 Jessops stores were closed yesterday.

Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on April 08, 2014, 04:48 PM:

It's the same old adage Rob and everyone else, having worked all my life for "large" companies ... the old joke has never been more appropriate; Question: How to you finish up being a wealthy successful businessman running a British small company?

Answer; Start off with a big one!

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on April 09, 2014, 02:38 AM:

My local Jessops has been open for some time with most of its original staff.

Posted by Graham Ritchie (Member # 559) on April 09, 2014, 04:15 AM:

Talking about "business" there was a British 1970s TV series that was very well made and its certainly worth watching... "The Brothers".

In my book most business that fail, do so to iffy upper management, not the poor peasants further down the ladder. When they do fail it happens quickly. Ansett NZ airline that I worked for a short time, did just that. The guys turned up for work in the morning and were told to pick up there personal belongings and were escorted by security on and off the premises. They went bust, owing millions and the holiday pay, retirement funds etc was all gone.

Lucky for me I had departed the scene a bit earlier when they closed the base engineering and got paid out, but felt sorry for the folk that got caught out in its final collapse a short time later.

Graham.

Posted by Rob Young. (Member # 131) on April 09, 2014, 06:32 AM:

Well, that was quite some rant I had there, wasn't it! [Eek!]

Must have had a bad week!!

Still, I stand by my assertion that "management" should be the first to take the blame; unfortunately, it seems that for whatever reason, the rest of the world is against me on this.

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