FOPP going titsup?

[cartridgemangler]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6252300.stm

:(

[Aural Flea]

Bummer :(

[Brown Bottle]

:no:What a shame. I love their shop on Tottenham Court Road. I had an hour to spare last Friday so thought I'd pay a visit, parked up round the corner, £4.00 in the metre, got to the shop, on the door 'Closed for Stock Take'. Struck me as suspicious at the time.

I might ask Ernst and Young for my £4.00. They might offer me 1p to the £.

I'm as guilty as anyone for seeking out cheap deals on the Net, I sppose you can't have it both ways.

Cheers BB

[Kaldison]

That's a damn shame, a visit to Fopp is the only way I can tolerate being dragged round the shops in the city centre on a weekend.

I really hope they manage to sort something out!

[eddie spaghetti]

That's a shame. I have ordered a number of CDs from Fopp in the past. Their websites states that they are unable to take orders online. Looks like curtains.

[earlofsodbury]

Yeah, it's all over the news this morning - crying bloody shame, they were the only high-street chain I'm not actively boycotting, and their prices were often excellent, but I think we're gonna lose all the big chain operations in the next few years - HMV are in trouble too... Downloading is the big issue, though cheap deals online have taken their toll, plus stupidly high business rates in most towns... :wall:

[cartridgemangler]

I can see both sides of this

Fopp were the first to aggressively discount product around 10 years ago.

I've had, reluctantly, to reconsider whether I continue to stock CDs in my shop purely because the internet selling below my cost price. the record industry is fucked, in my opinion...

[earlofsodbury]

cartridgemangler wrote:
...I've had, reluctantly, to reconsider whether I continue to stock CDs in my shop purely because the internet selling below my cost price. the record industry is fucked, in my opinion...


Yes, they fail dismally to look after the small retailerand lo-and-behold there are hardly any of them anymore, and record companies are crying their eyes out that sales are plummeting. Fuck meSherlock! - we might be onto something! :doh::doh::doh::wall:

Odd really that a business that trades in something so fast-moving and fashion driven is itself slower than a 3-legged dinosaur to adapt...

bunchercuntz

[griffo104]

Gutted. Bought so much vinyl when I started on a TT from their Leamington branch.

Sadly, free dowloads are starting to have an impact on 'proper' music. Lots of shops closing down on Berwick street as well.

I hate computers :realmad:

[eddie spaghetti]

griffo104 wrote:
Gutted. Bought so much vinyl when I started on a TT from their Leamington branch.

Sadly, free dowloads are starting to have an impact on 'proper' music. Lots of shops closing down on Berwick street as well.

I hate computers :realmad:

Don't blame the computers, blame the muppets who are downloading compressed music and don't care if it sounds shit or don't know any beter. Unfortunately, convenience, ignorance and marketing wins again.

[earlofsodbury]

eddie spaghetti wrote:
...blame the muppets who are downloading compressed music and don't care if it sounds shit or don't know any beter. Unfortunately, convenience, ignorance and marketing wins again.

:yes:2 Troo O'Grate 1 :^

[griffo104]

eddie spaghetti wrote:
griffo104 wrote:
Gutted. Bought so much vinyl when I started on a TT from their Leamington branch.

Sadly, free dowloads are starting to have an impact on 'proper' music. Lots of shops closing down on Berwick street as well.

I hate computers :realmad:

Don't blame the computers, blame the muppets who are downloading compressed music and don't care if it sounds shit or don't know any beter. Unfortunately, convenience, ignorance and marketing wins again.


Why blame the muppets ? If a computer/networks/internet allow easy swapping and sharing of files then why should anyone pay ?

The days of going out and doing the rounds of the records shops on a Monday to get the new releases are long gone - where I work there is only a HMV and look at the mess they are in now.

People at work still think I'm mad doing the rounds looking for albums and not downloading them - they just don't have a clue :der:

[eddie spaghetti]

griffo104 wrote:
eddie spaghetti wrote:
griffo104 wrote:
Gutted. Bought so much vinyl when I started on a TT from their Leamington branch.

Sadly, free dowloads are starting to have an impact on 'proper' music. Lots of shops closing down on Berwick street as well.

I hate computers :realmad:

Don't blame the computers, blame the muppets who are downloading compressed music and don't care if it sounds shit or don't know any beter. Unfortunately, convenience, ignorance and marketing wins again.


Why blame the muppets ? If a computer/networks/internet allow easy swapping and sharing of files then why should anyone pay ?

The days of going out and doing the rounds of the records shops on a Monday to get the new releases are long gone - where I work there is only a HMV and look at the mess they are in now.

People at work still think I'm mad doing the rounds looking for albums and not downloading them - they just don't have a clue :der:

I'm not against downloading per se. What i meant was those that download heavily compressed music and pay for it. It's paying for reduced quality. You can get CDs now for a £5 with an average of 10 tracks say and on Napster for example you pay 79p a track for compressed music. i wouldn't. :no:

[earlofsodbury]

Problem is most of the iPod-is-god muppetry comes from people using the things as a combination of fashion accessory and social anaesthesia to blot out the rest of the world: ironically using antisocial behaviour to blank antisocial behavior...

Just nattering with my ex, and apropos of nothing she said pretty much the same - her colleagues just can't understand why she prefers CDs to downloads! :doh:

[RichardG]

eddie spaghetti wrote:
You can get CDs now for a £5 with an average of 10 tracks say

Not for much longer if this goes on...

Is it me or is music MUCH TOO CHEAP????? How are independants supposed to compete when Tesco and the like sell for less than it costs a small retailer to buy - before he's paid rent/wages/electric etc.

In Cardiff we've got Spillers - officially the oldest record store in the world, but due to some faceless corporate "lifestyle" makeover of the block they're in, the rents are going through the roof and Spillers "don't fit the desired demographic" demanded by the guys in suits...

We're all to blame for demanding more for less, driving prices down by buying cheap imports from on-line retailers.

Who's next for the knife?

[cartridgemangler]

Now gone :(

[RichardG]

cartridgemangler wrote:
I can see both sides of this

Fopp were the first to aggressively discount product around 10 years ago.

I've had, reluctantly, to reconsider whether I continue to stock CDs in my shop purely because the internet selling below my cost price. the record industry is fucked, in my opinion...


Kenny - what sort of stuff do you sell (specialist genre or general)?

Are you in Glasgow city centre - I'm coming up from Cardiff for work in the next few weeks - I could buy something and keep the wolf from the door!

lmk

[cartridgemangler]

just a bit of scottish/trad folk to suppliment the instruments...

[griffo104]

eddie spaghetti wrote:
griffo104 wrote:
eddie spaghetti wrote:
griffo104 wrote:
Gutted. Bought so much vinyl when I started on a TT from their Leamington branch.

Sadly, free dowloads are starting to have an impact on 'proper' music. Lots of shops closing down on Berwick street as well.

I hate computers :realmad:

Don't blame the computers, blame the muppets who are downloading compressed music and don't care if it sounds shit or don't know any beter. Unfortunately, convenience, ignorance and marketing wins again.


Why blame the muppets ? If a computer/networks/internet allow easy swapping and sharing of files then why should anyone pay ?

The days of going out and doing the rounds of the records shops on a Monday to get the new releases are long gone - where I work there is only a HMV and look at the mess they are in now.

People at work still think I'm mad doing the rounds looking for albums and not downloading them - they just don't have a clue :der:

I'm not against downloading per se. What i meant was those that download heavily compressed music and pay for it. It's paying for reduced quality. You can get CDs now for a £5 with an average of 10 tracks say and on Napster for example you pay 79p a track for compressed music. i wouldn't. :no:


Eddie I totally agree with you on that one. 79p per track for poor quality, and they think we're daft :rotfl:

Funny that ipods are almost becoming the size where you can insert them into a certain hole where they belong on these muppets.

I may be a bit of a luddite but I still love music so much I want the best quality I can get. At some point fashion will dictate that this doesn't happen.

[Shakey]

As has been mentioned rents don't help. I've recently moved to Oxford and just before we found a house I was wandering around just outside the town centre and I saw a little shop space To Let (probably about the size o a small/medium corner shop), would've been perfect for a little record shop! Now, I'm usually far too cynical and pessimistic to even consider something like that, but I thought blow it! I'll ring up the agent and see what they say.......now I know Oxford aint exactly the cheapest place in the world but a year's rent was £25k!!!!!:shock:......shan't be botherin then:D...crazy!