Now where will I buy my Craftsman tool? The end is near for Sears.

Just after we moved down to California, we ended up with a $100 Sears gift card. We had planned to pick up an Xbox One, so we went to buy one.

Their electronics department was gutted - just mostly some dinged up TVs in the basement. They didn't have one, and the closest one in their system was a Kmart an hour away.

The kids were restless, so we said fuck it and left, buying it at Best Buy. We later used the gift card to buy a Kitchenaid mixer that was inexplicably marked down like 75% for my wife's parents, who paid us back in real money.

Months later, it closed up shop in like the space of two weeks.

At this point, I have to assume Sears is a joke perpetuated upon the free market.

I hear Macy's might be on their last legs too.

Yep, over 30 stores closing, including a location in Hawaii that's been around since 1946. I mean, in Hawaii? It's probably one of a handful on the whole island chain. How are you losing money there?

They got the rope.

Our local Sears is classy enough, but it's just one floor. They're jamming TVs and washers and lawn equipment and a few clothes all into a fairly small space. I could probably jog around the perimeter in a couple of minutes easily.

KMart kind of bought them out. In Miami, they have the Sears building; but a lot of people don't associate it with retail, anymore. Unless, you want to buy a tractor, you can get better junk at the Target.

Yeah, the writing's on the wall re: Sears, Macy's, JC Penney, etc et al!

Sam Goody & Musicland are kicking daisies for the same reasons K-Mart, Macy's, & a lot of other chain stores will be given last rites soon.

I thought Sam Goody was already kaput. I don't think I've seen one since before I enlisted, and that was at least seven years ago. Nor have i bought a CD since high school after I learned what MP3s were and converted the ones I already owned.

I miss tower records and Borders Books & Music. The one two punch of digital music followed by Amazon pretty much did most of the industry in.

Tower was an amazing place when vinyl was king. They had just about everything, and were open late. I used to hit the one in Hollywood any time I needed something unusual, and once I was in college, the Tower in Boston was the largest record store in the world. Many a time, I waited in line for the midnight release of something new. Fun times -- kids these days have no idea what they are missing.

As a former Border's employee, I can tell you that them going under was a mercy killing. They had a huge lead over the likes of Amazon and B&N, but they pissed it all away because they were idiots of the highest order. I'm not surprised that they went under, only that it took so long.

What do you think caused them to go under, considering they had such a lead over other retailers both online and brick & mortar?

Maybe it was their staff?

Absolutely inept management. When I started with them in 1990, they were operating not only bookstores, but also digital media stores (Waldensoft), which carried not only business software, but video game software and game cartridges. Lots of the stuff you see places like Amazon doing now, such as print-on-demand books, e-books, and the like, they were talking about doing before most people had even heard of the internet. They even owned a video store chain, but I can't remember which one now.

Instead of actually doing that, however, they continued to do things the way they'd always done them, or made total asses out of themselves in front of industry leaders. I can remember reading an article in a trade publication (Publisher's Weekly) about how the head of Waldenbooks/Borders invited the heads of the various publishing companies to discuss a promotion idea he had. Basically, he wanted the publishers to pay for him to make commercials about Waldenbooks/Borders, that would have "discussed the company's philosophy when it comes to book selling." I'll never forget reading about how after he pitched his proposal to the publishing heads they laughed in his face, since the law would require them to do the same for every other bookstore out there.

I can't remember going to Tower but I went to Virgin records in London a lot. Also I think one called BMG or something like that. My son has dozens/hundreds of vinyl records, and you have to respect that. Vinyl keeps music from becoming "background noise" in our hectic sensory assaulted modern world.

That is so true. Active listening is lost to thousand song playlists and shuffle mode.

On a related tangent, look how quickly smart phones killed mp3 players. Maybe 5 years ago, everyone had an iPod or some other less sexy mp3 player. Then smart phones came along and that market went away almost overnight. Point-and-shoot digital cameras too (after they first gobbled up film cameras).

Coming around again, that reminds me, with all the drive-thru coffee shops I see in parking lots, I entertained the idea of doing a "FotoMat" themed coffee kiosk. Of course I know nothing about running a drive-thru coffee business and I think the market of people who remember FotoMats is probably too small to be an effective differentiator: "What kind of stupid name is 'KoffeeMat'?"

There was, in fact, a company that did convert a bunch of fotomats in to a drive through coffee service. It was called Kwickava or some such, and they "proudly served" Choc-ful-a-nuts. They clearly didn't anticipate the taste shift that lead consumers to demand good coffee. This was just before Starbucks expanded in to the Boston market. It did not go well for Kwickawful.

Yeah, back in 1993 I actually saw a story from KXLY in Spokane about a drive-through coffee shop. The main "character" was a wacky barista who joked with the customers and was overall just loony/funny.

They called the piece "Nut in a Hut" and it won a national NPPA award that year.

BMG sold mail order CDs for dirt cheap. Like 10 CDs for $1 then $2 a CD there after and you had to buy 10 more. I remember signing up for them in high school.

I hate that Apple quit making the Classic iPod. None of their other devices hold as much music. The iTouch comes closest, but it's still maxed out at 128GB.

iPhones are no good to me for music storage because there's simply not enough space.

I think I may buy a refurbished Classic with a SSD inside. You can find them with up to 256GB of storage.

Same as Columbia House.

When I got my first CD player, I signed up for both services as an inexpensive way to build up my CD collection.

My biggest memory of tower records was that my older sister and her metal friends went there all the time becausr they would allow people to listen to records or CDs before they bought them. Plus they had band members sign albums, posters, or tour shirts then sold them for an extra mark up. They also let local bands play live for free in order to help them get known and so the store could sell snacks and drinks.

So my older sister, who had just turned 16 would ask my mom if she could borrow mom's car to go to Tower Records on Sports Arena Blvd with her friends and my mom would tell her she could if she agreed to take her little bother with her. That would be a 13.5 year old me. Of course, my older sister didn't want her friends to meet her little brother, much less to hang out, but the desire to borrow the car won over in the end.

Yeah, I still prefer listening to my music/podcasts on my iPod over using my phone. Not only do I have more room on the iPod (as well as better software than I can run on my POS Android phone), I don't have to worry about the battery on my phone going dead because I've been listening to music all day.

I bought an 80 gig iPod that I haven't come close to filling up. I originally planned on converting more of my videos into the iPod format, but then I joined the military and by the time I came back Stateside all the phones on the market had video playback and I wouldn't need to squint to watch on a Note 2.

On a related note, I needed ink for my printer so I popped over to the Office Depot this weekend. Shit. It is like Radio Shack or Sears. You can tell that the space is bigger than their current inventory. The staff is listless and useless and they don't have any of the things you'd make a trip to an office supply store for. I'm afraid the writing is on the wall for brick and mortar stores.

It is going to depend on the location.

I think your "After" price is WAY low. I don't recall exact details, but I seem to remember getting 12 CDs for a penny (or something ridiculous like that), but then you had to buy several more for at least $8 each, might've been $15 each. If you could find that many CDs that you wanted, it still priced out OK (better than retail stores), but it wasn't a great deal by any means.

Of course, the pricing difference may have just been timing. Guessing you & I were in the club at far different times....

BMG and Columbia House CDs (and records and tapes before that--I had a couple of different CH memberships in the 80s) often cost more than you'd pay at a retail store for an individual album. What helped the overall pricing, though, was that they'd run good sales where if you paid full price for one album, you could get two or three others for only $0.99 or $1.99, lowering the average price.

Am I the only one who ever just didn't complete the deal after receiving the teaser introductory shipment?