Maplin in Administration

Yes it is a shame. The Maplin catalogue was always a good place to find the bits I couldn't get in my local Electronics component shop back in my early teens.  

You're right, Mike, they do seem to have morphed into a later day Tandy.

I can't say that I'm surprised, in the last few years, where I have nearly always bought online, I have never found Maplin to be competitive on price, and their range of products seems a bit dated. Obviously, others might have different experiences, depending on the sort of products you're buying.

Maplin were good back in the 70s and 80s, but like so many companies expanded too much (in my view), service declined, stock shiften more mainstream, and then the eventual failure.

Nothing Lasts Forever - Roxy Music.

Its a pity though I liked going in there and ferreting around.

thebigfredc posted:

Its a pity though I liked going in there and ferreting around.

If they'd have had more buying and less ferreting ...

I must admit too, i'm also guilty of ferreting around rather than buying from Maplin. It will be a shame to see them go, I use to use them quite a bit years ago and my eldest son gets a lot of his tooling in there for when he is building his gaming PCs.

On another note: I read Toys R Us are no more as from today also. Oh how times are a certainly changing...I personally blame Amazon.

The ferreting was a kind of ritualistic foreplay which would often lead to full on, transactional intercourse.

Stephen Tate posted:

I must admit too, i'm also guilty of ferreting around rather than buying from Maplin. It will be a shame to see them go, I use to use them quite a bit years ago and my eldest son gets a lot of his tooling in there for when he is building his gaming PCs.

In my experience PC parts were about the only thing Maplin were competitively priced for ... but the market for that is shrinking / moving online where there can be more choice available.

Maplins were useful for connectors and components when you weren't entirely sure what you needed ... but when you can buy 2 Neutrik XLRs online for the price of one "Maplin" XLR in store, its not surprising that no one went there.  They will be missed however for the emergency parts / cabling situations - when you need a 5 or 10m USB cable to set up a printer "NOW" there will be a lack of alternatives in most towns.

On another note: I read Toys R Us are no more as from today also. Oh how times are a certainly changing...I personally blame Amazon.

Amazon do take the blame somewhat ... but Toys R Us especially and Maplins slightly are also guilty of having management  who have failed to have any vision.  A toy warehouse was a great idea in the 1990s, but they are soulless places these days when they could have been revitalised into "place centres" (or some such buzz word like that).

Innocent Bystander posted:

Maplin were good back in the 70s and 80s, but like so many companies expanded too much (in my view), service declined, stock shiften more mainstream, and then the eventual failure.

I think that Maplin were onto a very difficult business model to maintain ... originally they were an electronic components stockist and were an amazing source for all those bits that you needed to fix things or make things but as society became less into "fixing" and more into "replacing" as technology and progress accelerated and less into "tinkering" and building then their customer base dried up.

I think they made a valient attempt to evolve the business but computer parts are replaced so quickly and margins are so low unless you buy large stocks that then sit on shelves and become outdated then you simply can't compete with an online warehouse. Electric kiddie cars and the accompanying tat just weren't enough to save them... 

I'm really sad to see them go but damn am I amazed that they managed to hang on for so long. :-(

Phil

thebigfredc posted:

Its a pity though I liked going in there and ferreting around.

Problem with Maplin ferrets was they did not have any choice,  they only sold the N30 MnZn compound  ..........     

real shame - i purchase my much loved cleaner from them so tried to support them but gulity of the amazon purchase when I purchased couple of switches -