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Tom_PM · 06-21-2010, 09:01 AM

RadioShack used to be a good place to work and be store manager. They always had a hard time resisting the lure of non-inventory items that are volatile. Service contracts, both warranty and things like cell phone, long distance signups, and other intangibles that nevertheless are on the books.

When I worked there it was a Fortune 50 company. Not only top 100, but top 50, and that was the early 90's.

Their customer data goes back to the 1900 or so when it was Tandy Leather company. They'd mail you a free catalog and were very early in that form of marketing. Their data collection is very good, and one to model from. If it was a snowstorm in the northeast, you could easily call up the most recent few times in history when there was a similar storm in the similar area and see how many tickets/receipts were written per hour on those days and schedule employees accordingly. I'd bet not many of us are anywhere close to that in terms of raw data.

In the 60's and early 70's when Charles Tandy ran the joint, he discovered that he could buy vaccum tubes from the same factories that people like RCA were buying them from. So instead of buying RCA tubes, he'd buy the same tube before it was printed with the RCA brand and SKU. But instead of selling them way cheaper than RCA, he sold them for the SAME amount, but offered unlimited lifetime replacements if the tube ever failed. It was genius marketing to not only get a loyal customer base, but drive them back into the stores, where he'd also set up free tube testers for customers to use.

On personal computers, the backorders were so backed up at one point early on, that Tandy/RadioShack actually went out and bought thousands of IBM brand PC's and put new cases on them. They were busted doing it and paid pretty massive fines.

I really enjoyed working directly with customers when I did it there, but the "hands on everything" upper level managers really fucked it up and the first day I woke up and had more money in online sales than I would make at work all day, I decided to move on to this online gig. It would be sad if they actually failed because no matter where you live or work in the United States, you are within 5 miles of a radioshack location. They used to boast more company owned locations than McDonalds.

06-21-2010, 09:01 AM
Tom_PM Porn Meister Industry Role: Join Date: Feb 2005 Posts: 16,443	RadioShack used to be a good place to work and be store manager. They always had a hard time resisting the lure of non-inventory items that are volatile. Service contracts, both warranty and things like cell phone, long distance signups, and other intangibles that nevertheless are on the books. When I worked there it was a Fortune 50 company. Not only top 100, but top 50, and that was the early 90's. Their customer data goes back to the 1900 or so when it was Tandy Leather company. They'd mail you a free catalog and were very early in that form of marketing. Their data collection is very good, and one to model from. If it was a snowstorm in the northeast, you could easily call up the most recent few times in history when there was a similar storm in the similar area and see how many tickets/receipts were written per hour on those days and schedule employees accordingly. I'd bet not many of us are anywhere close to that in terms of raw data. In the 60's and early 70's when Charles Tandy ran the joint, he discovered that he could buy vaccum tubes from the same factories that people like RCA were buying them from. So instead of buying RCA tubes, he'd buy the same tube before it was printed with the RCA brand and SKU. But instead of selling them way cheaper than RCA, he sold them for the SAME amount, but offered unlimited lifetime replacements if the tube ever failed. It was genius marketing to not only get a loyal customer base, but drive them back into the stores, where he'd also set up free tube testers for customers to use. On personal computers, the backorders were so backed up at one point early on, that Tandy/RadioShack actually went out and bought thousands of IBM brand PC's and put new cases on them. They were busted doing it and paid pretty massive fines. I really enjoyed working directly with customers when I did it there, but the "hands on everything" upper level managers really fucked it up and the first day I woke up and had more money in online sales than I would make at work all day, I decided to move on to this online gig. It would be sad if they actually failed because no matter where you live or work in the United States, you are within 5 miles of a radioshack location. They used to boast more company owned locations than McDonalds. __________________ 43-922-863 Shut up and play your guitar. Last edited by Tom_PM; 06-21-2010 at 09:03 AM..