Radio Shack Sucks for DIY

Sorry, I

There was also a time when the staff knew how to use most of the things in the store... Now all they know is how to operate the cheap RC cars and cell phones (that take up half the store). They should just call it Best Buy and be done with it.

I don't know if you have them in IL, but Active Electronics is a great store for parts. Rows upon rows on components, wire, electronics tools, etc...

There's bound to be something similar near you.

There are stores like that further north in the Chicago burbs. I go to Tri-State Electronics whenever I'm up there. They have everything Radio Shack should have and more.

Unfortunately, nothing near my area.

I remember when I could buy 40xx CMOS ICs at Radio Shack. I've been watching their slow, agonizing death for some time.

and they might even be the crankiest sob's in more than 3 states.

Radio Shack decided that their future was in services. (Best Buy believes that too.) A third of RS's sales are in cellphones and calling plans.

Here's a recent article about RS and their troubles.

Gotta love the Concertmate though.

Originally posted by spokenward and they might even be the crankiest sob's in more than 3 states.

That's funny... I thought maybe I was just imagining it. I never ask them questions for this very reason. But I know where everything is, so I don't bother them.

Yeah, I know what they're thinking. IMO they will fail, or redefine success

Originally posted by Super 8 Gotta love the Concertmate though.

Indeed... A good friend of mine bought one of those new back in the day. I still remember the big cutout of Elton John endorsing it. We had a lot of fun with it.

For starters, the "electronics hobbyist" thing is waaaaay past its peak. Popular Electronics used to sell 400,000 issues each month, and Heathkit was a big deal. Those days are gone, for several reasons.

A store can't sustain itself by selling resistors, capacitors, etc. IMHO Radio Shack should have leveraged its name into a bitchin' web site for parts. Its slogan should have been "We have it. And if we don't, we'll get it." Without having the burden of maintaining stores, a web-based parts division would have probably done quite well. As to what the stores could sell to compete with Best Buy etc., well, I don't have an answer for that.

I think that one of the major reasons is that you can get music electronics dirt cheap now, so why bother building something yourself? For example, Behringer has a 5 input mixer that sells for $34.99!! You couldn't buy even the 1/4" jacks and knobs on this for that same price from Radio Shack. To build something functionally equivalent to this mixer as a DIY project using Radio Shack parts would probably cost about $300. No wonder why DIY projects aren't popular anymore.

At least they don't ask for your phone number anymore.

Theres a little Radio Shack store in my neighborhood that I try to support but it must be on the verge of going under. Only thing I buy there is a few dollars worth of electronic components.

Concertmates and Mooger Fooger's, man!

Also, I don't believe that Best Buy has a Battery of the Month Club.

Radio Shack was a cool store.

I got my first real component Stereo from them, in the late 70's. Got my first computer there, a TRS-80 CoCo.

I used to have fun with those little wire boxes they made, where you could hook wires together and make lights turn on, when you hit a button, or you could use hydro-electricity to power the light.

Link

Neat stuff!

People don't build things anymore. It's all about software now.

here's the Aussie version of Radio Shack and they do have an online service as you suggested - they are still thriving

http://www.dse.com.au/cgi-bin/dse.storefront/4414908e12244042273fc0a87f9c06ee

cheers

john

Some interesting responses

I think we may be confusing RadioShack's core competency...their strength may very well be/have been as a "retail outlet" as opposed to an "electronic parts supplier"

so, the shift may very well have made sense given their biz model

kind of the "BSA effect"

Anyway, we weren

One element of "corporate culture" is what people say about themselves.

The electronics parts stores that I remember used to were back from the days when there was a radio/TV repair shop on every other corner. Those, as well as ham radio operators and the occaional DIY hobbyist were their customers. When TV sets became disposable, repair shops closed up, and those parts distributors lost their customer base.

When I was in high school in the late 1950s, we had at least eight fully stocked electronics parts distributors in the DC area, as well as Uncle George's Radio Ham Shack, a store that stocked components and gear for the radio amateur. Today we have one left where I can stil get resistors and capacitors, but they're mostly oriented to the industrial installation (mostly LANs and security systems) trade.

Radio Shack started out back when people knew what the "radio shack" was. I can still get an occasional resistor or cable on Sunday, but it's not like it used to be, and it was never a serious parts distributor. Still, it was a store and it kept fairly extended hours. (If I needed something from Electronic Wholsalers, I had to skip school or wait until Saturday).

There are a few web sites that have a far better stock of parts than Radio Shack. I frequently order from Digi-Key. The problem with a web-based distributor is that you have to wiat to get your stuff. If you could fix the console and get the session back running by replacing the bridge rectifier in the power supply, you could take a lunch break, pick up a new bridge at Radio Shack, and have it back up and running by the time the band gets back. If you had to order it from a web site, the best you could do if you were willing to pay for premium shipping is get it the next morning.

But then, how many people today who have studios could diagnose a problem that they could fix with a Radio Shack part? No wonder electronics parts distributors are going the way of button hooks.

I haven't been in our local Radio Shack for at least a year. Then, when I went in to look for cabling and connections one of the cell sellers asked if they could help. You should have seen the look on that person's face. Didn't have a clue and scuttled back behind the counter where he was safe, or relatively so.

Anyone know if Lafayette Electronics is still around? They were a mail order electronics parts store that blew Radio Shack away when it came to parts availabilty. My stepdad was a Ham Radio Operator and built much of his own equipment and generally used Lafayette over RS. Did some Heathkit too.

Oh, just ran a Google search. Came back in' but in a different guise.

AFAIK, Lafayette Electronics went under about 20 years ago,at least around here. I used to like that store for their in-house brand stereo and quad stuff. They had much better quality than the Radio Shack Realistic brand.

In 1987 I went to work for Radio Shack as a store manager with the primary desire to learn how to manage a business. Radio Shack was an extremely entrepreneurial company that gave its managers a wide berth with respect to creativity on how to run the business. The base pay was ludicrously low but the bonuses paid on profit could be substantial and the benefits were incredible. Since there was no POS system, cost was estimated to be 53.5% of selling price. We did inventory every two months to reconcile the actual GP with the estimated. Any profit in excess of 46.5% was considered

I started looking elsewhere years ago because of their extremely poor quality plus extremely high prices.

Radio Shack:

"You can buy better, but you can' t pay more!"

Most towns of any fair size have a local parts jobber that sells to electronics manufacturers and repair shops and so forth. Look in the yellow pages.

Note that if you call them, it may be beneficial to open with something like, "Hi, I'm Dave from Custom Audio LTD" or similar 'letterhead' phrase. Some of these places won't sell to Joe Sixpack.

Time passes. Rat Shack used to be cool, but no more. Real "hackers" used to be known for their soldering skills, and for creating bizarre but useful interfaces between devices. I found my Dad's copy of "The TV/Typewriter Cookbook" the other day - how to make a video interface for a primitive PC from scratch using simple IC and discrete components. Good times.

There are still niche markets for this, but I think that it's all gone mail-order now. EEPROM programmers, and similar.

Is Jameco still around ? They had a lot of nice experimenter stuff.

The coupe de grace may be this: http://blog.ce-pro.com/news/6589.html

http://www.ajc.com/search/content/opinion/stories/0228edceo.html

Apparently another crooked CEO.

Such a shame. Radio Shack used to be such a great chain.

Another victim of Wal-Mart and the ME-ME-ME era. This guy should not have gotten a 1 million $everance.

i'm not sure so much about the history of radio shack. i remember i used it when i was a kid because it was the only place around. and i go there now when i'm desperate. (last time was to buy an adapter for a keyboard i found lying on the street. but $15 just to plug the thing in? i wasn't that desperate . . )

but when i was in college, as an electrical engineer, radioshack was kind of a joke. the bread boards were so crappy looking and circuit parts were so expensive. it was always easier to order from online. the speed was an issue but, again, radioshack was only there for the desperate builder.

thread!

I should maybe say first, that I do have a great appreciation for Allied Radio. For it's war effort and contribution to radio. Thankfully both before my time:)

Wish I had more time for a longer reply. Philbo covered my thoughts on RS as a parts supplier very well. Any city will have a better place to buy parts than RS; in quality, availability and price. Check the yellow pages, under Electronic Parts. You will find both wholesale and retail. Another spot to check might be your local amp tech, or amp builder.

I totally gave up on RS years ago, when they stopped selling their complete line of guitar speakers. I feel that for a long time they have been OK for something like a fuse in a hurry, but not much else. At one time their speakers were very good. Not JBLs or EVs, but very good for the price I feel.

A thought about Heathkit, and the many other past kit offering companies. They were indeed huge in their day. However, they never really covered DIY, like parts for repair work or your own experiments.

Further on kits. I feel there is a modern day surge in tube DIY kit building. Probably generated by the generally high cost of tube gear. I would guess that just in the last 5 years the amount of companies offering guitar tube amp kits alone has at least tripled.

Also, since the 80s, the availability of hi-fi kits is ever increasing as 50s and 60s tube gear gets rarer and more costly. Dynaco is back, but only with limited models.

As long as there are people using tubes, I think the DIY market is alive and well, if not just as a cost cutting measure, just for the sake of saying:

"I built that, don't it make ya fell like dancing":D

All for now,

-Rob-