Sunday, April 07, 2019

Just die already.



I didn't start the day planning to stop into Fry's Electronics, but I suddenly had a little bit of time to kill before my ramen place opened,  and thought - lets see if anything from CES has started to hit the stores yet.

When I walked in I immediately was like - did they make the isles wider?  But as I went through the store I could see things were much more dire. Every single isle had empty shelves. Circa 2008. I honestly don't even know how they can call themselves an electronics store anymore because they sell very little electronics. Almost everything there is straight out of "as seen on TV".

It freaked me out hard enough that I rejiggered my whole day so I could stop by a Best Buy to see if this was just a Fry's Electronics problem or a wider problem like those mall markdown signs.

Thankfully Best Buy looked much better. So, I don't know if Fry's is a leading indicator or they are still just suffering from that VP that embezzled 65 million dollars during the recession. Perhaps a little of both. It been a few months since I've been in there, but today definitely felt like a Sears going out of business vibe. I think maybe Fry's just shows the strain a little quicker because of their past "issues".

I don't understand how they keep managing to scrape through, but I think they should just give up and put condos there. And yes, every time one of these giant stores looks shaky I look at their physical footprint and calculate the amount of condos that can go on that lot.















I've seen Fry's look like this before during the recession but really freaked me out was their TV isle. Lots of missing spaces.





Then I went over to Best Buy to find them selling 8K TV's. For what reason I do not know. There isn't even any content for 4K TV's. But 8K is twice as good as 4K - so there is that.

11 comments:

  1. The first thing corporate does is cut staff hours if sales don't meet expectations. So there likely could be a stockroom bursting with still-boxed merch and no hours scheduled to stock shelves. It's a retarded circle.

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  2. Huh. That is an interesting perspective. Welcome to the Blog Mark!

    On a side note - did anyone know that Carmax was spun off from Circuit Shitty? Fry's has been around longer than I have been alive. I was trying to figure our when they both started and ran across this article.

    Seems like these stores never really die. They just pop up with a new name.

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  3. I haven't seen a Fry's in more years than I can count, but I believe I did go in one sometime this century..

    Talk about growing aisles, Walmart has that. I travel & see lot's of different Walmart stores (mostly the food section) and they are all getting lots more room between the shelves. Less stuff on the shelves too, less choice on brands.

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  4. Ok, thats painful to look at. Mind I'd kill to have that much aisle space at work, but still. Ow.

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  5. That is an interesting comment Rob. I will have to keep an eye out for isle creep. Before this weekend I didn't know that was a thing. I thought it was only isolated to Fry's.

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  6. Capital of Texas RefugeeThursday, April 11, 2019 8:33:00 PM

    "... a little bit of time to kill before my ramen place opened ..."

    And She Said she's not a hipster ... HAHAHAHAHAHA YISS. :-)

    Seriously, you're no longer a broke-azz college hipster.

    I can make my own ramen with buckwheat soba and beef bone broth, but if you find yourself craving ramen often, buy some vitamin B1 supplements.

    You can also afford to splurge occasionally on shabu-shabu. :-)

    If you really want to be Japanese food hipstery though, go find a place that does binchotan barbecue instead ...

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  7. Hahahahah. I didn't go to college. Which is why I am illiterate.

    I just admire how good the Japanese are at feeding people. Food comes quick and you can get on with your life. Not like American restaurants that take forever to get the bill once you are done. A lot of times I'm like - just let me leave!

    If you think all that stuff is hipster - these Japanese soufflé pancakes have suddenly become the rage.

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  8. Capital of Texas RefugeeFriday, April 12, 2019 5:50:00 PM

    My first reaction: OMG ... could she mean お好み焼き ... that would be so cool ... oh.

    Not お好み焼き ... it's those fluffy pancakes that became hipstery in Osaka for a while.

    BTW, this is pretty much the best option for お好み焼き in North America, but the Osaka hipsters think it's not authentic enough.

    Fuck them, I used to make mine with mesquite smoked beef and barbecue sauce in Texas. :-)

    I also try not to eat big mountains of carbs because that's really not cool.

    Someone needs to tell these food hipsters that sledge hammering their insulin resistance with fluffy sledge hammers is also very not cool. :-)

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  9. お好み焼き - I don't really understand what is going on there. It can't be potatoes - right? Japanese don't do potatoes.

    I haven't actually tried those pancakes yet. I sort of have a kink for pancakes, but I really never eat them because they make me crash too fast. My body needs more protein. But if you ask me if I want pancakes I will say yes every single time. When we get to the restaurant - I never order them. But I will have a couple of waffle shots from Mr S.

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  10. Capital of Texas RefugeeSaturday, April 13, 2019 3:21:00 AM

    お好み焼き ... okonomiyaki, the original Japanese omelette, where the rules are actually "there are no fucking rules", and so I don't get these whiny Osaka hipster types with their irritating "authenticity" bullshit.

    I figured you'd search for the Japanese text and get to see all kinds of awesome okonomiyaki pictures.

    The restaurant I linked to is in Toronto near Bloor-Yonge next to the Manulife building, and it's been there for at least two decades that I know of ...

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  11. OH! Eggs. I guess I always forget they do eggs. I don't really get it in Ramen, but I know they do those million year egg crap.

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