I was driving the kids to soccer the other day and noticed someone standing on the corner of two busy streets, spinning a sign in his hands. It had the Circuit City logo on it and announced a store closing sale, and a big 20% off verbage. Smaller print said "up to" near the 20%, but more on this later.
I was surprised since this was a store that opened less than a few months ago, taking the place of a Target that moved down the road. It's a decent location, and I can only guess that the recent woes of Circuit City as a company are contributing to this. I guess I'd mention there's a Best Buy that's about 2 miles South of this store and another one that's about 5 miles North of it, so perhaps they can't get enough traffic in there.
I was busy that day, but with the need to purchase a bunch of prizes soon, I thought this would be a good place to load up on a few things. Typically I go to Best Buy every year, but Circuit City enticed me. So I stopped by there the next day to check things out.
I had every intention of buying something and picked up a basket when I walked in to put things in. I started wandering in the TV area, needing a LCD mount, but not really anything else. I went to see iPods and Zunes, then computer stuff, and I realized something. Almost everything in the store was marked at 5% or 10% off. Accessories tended to be in the 15% range, but I stopped and actually walked around, looking for something that was 20% off. It seemed to be limited to music CDs, although there were a few things at 30% off (auto install kits).
I felt cheated.
This feels like every other sale that they might normally run, 10% off, which I can get at Amazon, and likely Best Buy.
I know this is the beginning of their closure, and there's a chance I would go back, but honestly that's not likely. If I see a 30% or even a 50% off sign, I'm going to guess that most things are 10-20% off. Or that there is very little stuff left and why waste my time.
Something like this probably does more damage to the Circuit City brand to me than anything. I've bought stuff from them since I was 15 years old, over 25 years now, and I would buy more from them if they were closer. When this store opened, I needed a mouse and a couple things one day and went here instead of Best Buy.
That won't be the case anymore.
There has to be a decent cost to keeping the store open, paying employees, etc. Perhaps they're stuck with a certain level of fixed costs and don't want to sell out too quickly, but honestly they would be better off having a real sale, go 20% off on every thing, take some losses (you're going to anyway) and make people feel good. If you turn around things in the company, you're going to want that goodwill.
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