My local Maplin is a bit strange in regards to workers.
In the main they are very friendly and say hello when I go in and are eager to help.
One bloke always just ignores me and turns the other way as I walk by.
A young girl who worked there I heard her talk to another worker.
She looked towards me and said "That bloke comes in often but buys very little"
My hearing is very good for my age and I picked it all up.
I was steaming as I have been a Maplin customer since 1980 and must have spent thousands over the years. So I complained about her to Maplin.
The next time I went in one of the workers collared me and apologised and said they agreed that I had spent a lot of money over the years.
In the main they are very friendly and say hello when I go in and are eager to help.
One bloke always just ignores me and turns the other way as I walk by.
A young girl who worked there I heard her talk to another worker.
She looked towards me and said "That bloke comes in often but buys very little"
My hearing is very good for my age and I picked it all up.
I was steaming as I have been a Maplin customer since 1980 and must have spent thousands over the years. So I complained about her to Maplin.
The next time I went in one of the workers collared me and apologised and said they agreed that I had spent a lot of money over the years.
When Maplin first started (over 30 years ago?) components and kits were their main products; the catalogue was a useful DIY information source. Then they changed ownership, lost the plot, and started selling toys on every High Street. The inevitable result was a long time coming, but has now arrived. The same can happen to any business where the owners don't understand their business, but they will always blame failure on anything else but their own ignorance.avtech23 said:
I remember in 1980 building Maplin's 50 watt amplifier kit.
You had to fill in an order form and send it in to Rayleigh in Essex.
It was rare to get back your full order as they often had one or more items out of stock.
I remember the pcb being missing and so was the heatsink ! A bit fundamental to the project.
Maplin has been trying to compete with online stores while at the same time charging high prices for gear. I wanted an HDMI cable and they were £12-50 at Maplin's, I got 2 on ebay for £2-50 ! So its not surprising they have gone bust.
Quite a few times I went in for components and there were 3 or 4 staff on and just me in. The big building must be expensive for rent and all the big flood lights were on.
You had to fill in an order form and send it in to Rayleigh in Essex.
It was rare to get back your full order as they often had one or more items out of stock.
I remember the pcb being missing and so was the heatsink ! A bit fundamental to the project.
Maplin has been trying to compete with online stores while at the same time charging high prices for gear. I wanted an HDMI cable and they were £12-50 at Maplin's, I got 2 on ebay for £2-50 ! So its not surprising they have gone bust.
Quite a few times I went in for components and there were 3 or 4 staff on and just me in. The big building must be expensive for rent and all the big flood lights were on.
Whenever I wanted a couple of opamps or transistors I would check the stock in the local store and they would have one of one and none of the others. When these would cost them pence and they were selling them at a substantial mark-up, which idiot deemed that the stock levels were adequate to satisfy buyers. I stopped attempting to buy anything years ago.
There was some chat about this on another forum. I suspect that some retail analyst/consultant had told the management that if they only sold on average two NE5532 per week then they only needed to stock one or two, and restock twice a week. Nobody noticed that many customers actually asked for four, so the average two per week actually represented a few customers satisfied and many customers annoyed who never came back. They didn't know that many wanted four because they never stocked that many so they never sold that many in one transaction.
There was one on Hillgate called Electro Supplies, just off the mini roundabout. Regularly spent my pocket money in there on Saturday mornings.They used to sell 'Lucky Bags' for a couple of pounds that contained totally random surplus parts with a healthy selection of passives thrown in for good measure. I remember getting my first analogue multimeter in there when I was 8, still got it in the loft somewhere.
It is a shame those types of shops have gone but, as others have said, times have changed and they simply can't compete.
I just buy cheap ink cartridge copies and haven't had any problems.
Original cartridges are extortionately expensive.
Those of us who lived in the USA saw the same thing happen slowly and painfully, stretched out over a period of many years, to Radio Shack. I also saw the same thing happen to a handful of mom-n-pop electronics shops, which were already the last of their breed by the time I moved to Los Angeles in the 1990's.
It's sad to watch something that was a part of your life fade away until it disappears.
I'm not so sure that the failure of electronics hobbyist supply stores are primarily due to ineptitude on the part of management. Times change. Hobbies and cultural interests come, and then they go. There are a lot fewer model train shops these days, too.
At one time, you could build your own electronics devices at home to match or exceed anything you could find in the stores. That isn't true for todays cutting-edge electronics any longer. Nobody is building their own DIY cell-phone that matches the performance of the newest from Samsung or Apple. Nobody is building their own gigantic 4k TV.
For the young people of today, those are typical of the electronic items that capture their interest. And you cannot come anywhere close to making your own version at home, so why bother? Why tinker with the sort of electronics that your grandfather grew up with? Where's the fun in that?
-Gnobuddy
People have things like computers, mobile phones and game stations to keep them occupied now.
There is also the wife factor where a lot of modern women want more attention from their partners and the hubby sat in his room playing doesn't cut it any longer.
We have a couple of heritage railways in my area and they all complain about lack of members/volunteers.
There is also the wife factor where a lot of modern women want more attention from their partners and the hubby sat in his room playing doesn't cut it any longer.
We have a couple of heritage railways in my area and they all complain about lack of members/volunteers.
The Ffestiniog and Welsh Highland Railway have got lottery funding to offer 20
year long apprenticeships
My wife and I often sit side by side enjoying our hobbies - we might be making music together, or she might be knitting, painting, or making jewelry while I sketch out circuit ideas, populate a circuit board, read, play guitar, or solder in a few components on the living room coffee-table.
I do have a few hobbies that are so left-brained and require so much concentrated attention that I don't have enough brain capacity left over to be social at the same time, such as writing computer programs or working out mathematical problems. Those hobbies are best done alone.
I enjoy my hobbies, but I love my wife - maybe I'm the odd one out, but most of the time, I'd rather spend time with her than tinkering alone.
-Gnobuddy
I spent a lot of time when I was married trying to improve my situation by doing electronics and maths courses to get a better job.
All my wife did was whine that I didn't spend enough time with her.
I tried to explain that I was trying to make a better life for both of us but she wasn't interested. So long as she got attention (any attention and from anyone) it didn't matter.
It eventually blew the marriage apart.
A bit of a shock to be alone after 23 years but I prefer it now, I can do what I want, when I want. Living room is my workshop and stacked to the ceiling with speakers, not many wives would tolerate that.
It sounds as though she never quite finished growing up. I'm sorry to hear you had to go through all that.
I've noticed this syndrome is much more common in people who grew up in densely populated cities, where they were always surrounded by other people, and never spent any time alone with themselves when they were young.
If you were lucky enough to wander through the woods and fields by yourself as a child, you learn to enjoy time alone as well as time with other people.
-Gnobuddy
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