High Street chain collapse sweepstake

[WillPS]

Grainger Games - a gaming store chain based in Newcastle with 67 stores has closed all its stores.

It's a shame as they always had great service and they were reasonably priced - the one in my local town centre was always quite quiet, but the Grainger Games in Sale where I used to live always had a steady flow of customers.

Didn't realise they were still going. Best remembered for ruining an awards evening a few years back.

I had no knowledge of that but gawd it does give some insight to the sort of organisation that it was.

The last couple of times I went in they had hardly any games but seemed to mostly sell old used phones at prices that would make Cex blush and those bloody awful "Pop" vinyl figurines.

[sqwidge1978]

Grainger Games - a gaming store chain based in Newcastle with 67 stores has closed all its stores.

It's a shame as they always had great service and they were reasonably priced - the one in my local town centre was always quite quiet, but the Grainger Games in Sale where I used to live always had a steady flow of customers.

Didn't realise they were still going. Best remembered for ruining an awards evening a few years back.

I had no knowledge of that but gawd it does give some insight to the sort of organisation that it was.

The last couple of times I went in they had hardly any games but seemed to mostly sell old used phones at prices that would make Cex blush and those bloody awful "Pop" vinyl figurines.

Doesn't bode too well for Game then, as that is also their business model.

[WillPS]

Didn't realise they were still going. Best remembered for ruining an awards evening a few years back.

I had no knowledge of that but gawd it does give some insight to the sort of organisation that it was.

The last couple of times I went in they had hardly any games but seemed to mostly sell old used phones at prices that would make Cex blush and those bloody awful "Pop" vinyl figurines.

Doesn't bode too well for Game then, as that is also their business model.

Oh yeah Game has no future. Neither does HMV really, unless the vinyl craze never dies off.

[bilky asko]

I do remember someone in the Three shop up the road from my nearest Game saying that they pay the best prices on your old phone.

Incidentally, the old Gamestation shop across the way is still empty to this day, still with the closing down sign up and the floor decals present.

[MetalGearRex]

I had no knowledge of that but gawd it does give some insight to the sort of organisation that it was.

The last couple of times I went in they had hardly any games but seemed to mostly sell old used phones at prices that would make Cex blush and those bloody awful "Pop" vinyl figurines.

Doesn't bode too well for Game then, as that is also their business model.

Oh yeah Game has no future. Neither does HMV really, unless the vinyl craze never dies off.

As late as 2016 they had a significant drop in credit insurance, which wasn't helped by the transition from PS3/Xbox 360 to PS4/Xbox One. IIRC EA threatened not to sell stock, and Sony wanted the sale of their games to go towards paying for stock (GAME couldn't pay Sony for all of the supply).

GAME are notorious for overpricing games upon release - and their loyalty incentives aren't enticing either. Online retailers are now offering better deals on games and even Sony and Microsoft have been pushing it with their digital sales (and subsequently playing a part in making digital games commonplace). It doesn't help that a good chunk of console/PC owners have migrated to owning digital copies of games, in my experience a significant chunk of my PS4/PS3 library is digital.

[Martin Phillp]

Bargain Booze acquired by Bestway.

https://news.sky.com/story/bargain-booz ... n-11318918

[thegeek]

I had a wonder into Maplin on Friday on the off chance I'd be able to pick up a bargain.. to be fair, some of the tat was heavily discounted, but anything useful (like HDDs, components), Amazon / ebay is still significantly cheaper.

Walking around the store, it's no wonder it went under, but i will miss browsing the geeky bits and bobs.

Loved Tandy as a kid and this is really the last place you can go to buy some resistors or an obscure connector for a project.

I forgot to bring my laptop charger to work on Friday, so popped down to Maplin and managed to get a USB-C charger that was cheaper than the one I was looking at online, which was handy.

[edit]
the powerline ethernet adapters that I'd been mulling over the weekend have now sold out - presumably on account of being cheaper than Amazon. Plenty of non-bargains to be had though, like £4.99 for a 'value' lightning cable, or £2.79 for a mouse mat.

[g67bbx]

I know it's not High Street but both Kleeneze and Betterware have gone into administration within the last few days.
I think the days of catalogue shopping are nearly over.

[Philip]

Anybody want a piece of Homebase?

[Pete]

Re: bettaware / kleeneze, I suppose most of their market has now been gobbled up by Amazon and at lower prices. Lakeland has physical stores and a slightly more affluent demographic. Wonder how they'll cope.

Was the kitchen tat catalogue model similar to your makeup reseller (Younique) style thing where you bought x amount of the rubbish at wholesale then sold it on in demos or was it purely dumping cataloges around the place and then begging for them back?

[all new Phil]

Lakeland is definitely the Waitrose demographic, so probably at the least risk of losing people to Amazon. That said, the one at the Trafford Centre is usually pretty quiet.