| Bloody hell bob break it to me gently will ya. |
Toys r us ripping the arse • Page 3
-
mrpon 37,366 posts
Seen 2 hours ago
Registered 15 years ago -
Decks wrote:
I'm not sure I agree. Right now online is profitable because it's relatively unregulated. A lot of online retailers, especially the major ones, profit from tax loopholes and get away with absolutely appalling health & safety standards.
Highstreet shops won't exist in a generations time.
Sure, for certain things like physical games, music CDs, DVDs/Blurays, books, there's a problem justifying a brick & mortar presence, but in most cases that's due to retail chains putting in zero fucking effort into innovating or justifying their existence.
As someone pointed out, Smyths is doing pretty well, as are shops like Waterstones. Bookshops are doing pretty well in general due to the failure of e-books to really take off and the inability to really sample a book properly based on a few pages of a PDF.
Clothes stores also can't really be effectively replaced. It's such a fucking rigmarole ordering stuff just to find that it doesn't fit properly and you have to send it back and wait 2-3 days for the next size to be sent.
We had a couple of great examples of how online and brick & mortar can be unified in C&A recently (we still have C&A in Germany): fully knowing that people would try something on in store and then order it online, C&A prints the order numbers that you can search for on the C&A website and order it from there. My wife was looking for a dress for a wedding we're going to later in the year but it wasn't in her size, and thanks to this function we were able to order it from the site in her size and get it sent to us. Likewise, I occasionally order a game from our local Saturn store, pay for it online and pop down to pick it up.
I'd imagine that the high street will trend towards reinventing itself as a "premium" experience compared to the "budget" online experience. A games store for instance might offer "gaming cafés" that let you play on consoles together with friends or even strangers over a coffee. Game, obviously, completely fails to offer anything relevant.
Besides, I'm not sure Generation Z is going to be as online-centric in terms of their shopping habits as Generation X or Y. This is the generation that's growing up with fake news & Russian propaganda and I'd imagine that they're going to be the first generation to more widely shun social media in favour of "real" experiences. I already know more than enough teenagers who are irritated by parents fixated on their smartphones. -
mothercruncher 19,474 posts
Seen 4 hours ago
Registered 15 years agoI’m not sure what Smyths do that’s different to Toys R Us , if they’re doing well still somehow.
Both need a drive out of town, both are piled high with neon toys, both make a cursory go at letting you play with STI encrusted Nintendo DS’s, both have glum staff and both have a general White Lightning-esque vibe in the air. It’s always felt to me like Smyths are TRU by a different name. -
nickthegun 87,711 posts
Seen 2 hours ago
Registered 16 years agoSmyth's have a better range of toys and their stores don't look like they are about to fall apart.
For something the size of an aircraft hangar, TRU never actually have what I want, whereas Smyths usually do and more. -
Decks 31,013 posts
Seen 4 hours ago
Registered 6 years agoSmyths is cheap. -
Decks 31,013 posts
Seen 4 hours ago
Registered 6 years agoOr cheaper anyway. -
whatthefu 1,340 posts
Seen 3 hours ago
Registered 15 years agoFilthyAnimal wrote:
Interesting. I don't know any teenagers, but most young people I see are always glued to their phone. It's interesting you think the young uns see their parents glued to their phones.
Besides, I'm not sure Generation Z is going to be as online-centric in terms of their shopping habits as Generation X or Y. This is the generation that's growing up with fake news & Russian propaganda and I'd imagine that they're going to be the first generation to more widely shun social media in favour of "real" experiences. I already know more than enough teenagers who are irritated by parents fixated on their smartphones.
But with this news and Maplin as well, I'm wondering again about the future of the high street shop. It is good for quickness to be able to pop in to a shop and walk home with the item. But for online, well I bought a 9v battery yesterday in a shop, for 40p more amazon would have sold me two batteries.
I would worry will the online shops creep up in price if the high street isnt there to compete with them.. -
PazJohnMitch 17,276 posts
Seen 17 hours ago
Registered 14 years ago@spindle9988
HMV games pricing philosophy used to be “just make it the same as GAME”.
Even though that was 10 years ago it does not appear to have been updated. -
Baihu1983 14,378 posts
Seen 2 hours ago
Registered 10 years agoLot of memories of those shops but can't remember the last time I bought something from them.
Might have been the original Xbox. -
up_the_ante 1,574 posts
Seen 1 hour ago
Registered 14 years agoI remember buying super soakers and getting all my birthday money together to buy an N64 there. Ah the 90s 😁 -
Think the last thing I bought from toys r us was super metroid for the SNES.
Thought they went bust years ago tbh -
superbob85 wrote:
I certainly do. I've given up on cds but I much prefer owning physical copies of films. Not even sure it's more convenient for me, as I'd need to transfer films to a memory stick from PC to watch anything on my TV. And I like owning things still.
The thing is does anyone buy CD's or DVD's anymore everything is so much more convenient online. It's all going digital unfortunately I would like to know how the high street clothing stores are still open. -
nickthegun 87,711 posts
Seen 2 hours ago
Registered 16 years ago -
neems 5,635 posts
Seen 2 hours ago
Registered 13 years agoClick and collect is where it's at. Don't have to worry about things being delivered while you're at work, and makes it easier to return an item. -
Baihu1983 14,378 posts
Seen 2 hours ago
Registered 10 years agosuperbob85 wrote:
I do. Albums if it's an artist or group i'm a fan of only buying the odd track digitally.
The thing is does anyone buy CD's or DVD's anymore everything is so much more convenient online. It's all going digital unfortunately I would like to know how the high street clothing stores are still open.
And I buy 4k and Blu-Ray as the quality is better than digital not to mention 4ks come with all 3 versions which I can give to others. -
Where the fuck am I going to buy kerplunk from now. -
elstoof 28,125 posts
Seen 3 hours ago
Registered 16 years agoFrom the massive charity shop that’ll open up in its place -
SnackPlissken 3,512 posts
Seen 5 days ago
Registered 4 years agoWhenever I see someone bigging up digital I think of my wii shop purchases that I can never get back. Thanks guys. -
Dirtbox 92,595 posts
Seen 19 hours ago
Registered 19 years agoAll that'll be left are bars, restaurants and convenience stores while drones zip around overhead delivering everything else down our chimneys.
Not all that bothered tbh, it's just another step toward a future where we'll be able to replicate whatever we want. -
Baihu1983 14,378 posts
Seen 2 hours ago
Registered 10 years agoYep would rather keep what I buy.
Not tried apple 4k but I don't have any apple products. -
mal 29,326 posts
Seen 3 years ago
Registered 20 years agoAll these out of town centres seem to have a pet accoutrements shop pretty much in centre of them, pride of place. Next to a craft shop.
I don't pretend to understand it. Presumably this is how the other half live. -
mothercruncher 19,474 posts
Seen 4 hours ago
Registered 15 years agoThe high street, once a place where we could acquire all our consumerist tat, is going to become a place full of charity shops where we can offload our (barely used and obsolete) consumerist tat. -
mal 29,326 posts
Seen 3 years ago
Registered 20 years agoI'm not sure about that. I've not seen a charity shop that didn't own the freehold of it's property - it's the only way the can afford so little footfall yet still remain open. Most high streets plots are usually council owned and rented out to shops on short term leases, which is why they're so liable to go tits up like this. The out of town parks where you more commonly find Toys 'R' Us is likely owned by some financing firm who are just in it for the money, but the result is similar. -
One of my friends was a charity shop manager but they've been made redundant as they weren't making enough to cover the rent. -
Nazo 1,951 posts
Seen 4 hours ago
Registered 12 years agoCharity shops won't own the property but they get massive business rates relief, are VAT exempt and are mostly staffed by volunteers, which gives them a huge competitive advantage compared to regular shops. -
Rogueywon 12,387 posts
Seen 2 hours ago
Registered 16 years agoDon't worry, it won't just be charity shops.
There'll be bookies as well.
Edited by Rogueywon at 07:39:31 01-03-2018 -
SnackPlissken wrote:
Yeah, I think the shutdown of the PS3 and 360 servers (probably in a couple of years from now) are going to be the major catalyst that puts the brakes on digital distribution. Right now, we've not had a major gaming download provider shut down that anyone really gave a shit about. The PC lost Desura and Shinyloot, but they died precisely because nobody cared about them (both lost most of their already-meagre user base when they betrayed their principles).
Whenever I see someone bigging up digital I think of my wii shop purchases that I can never get back. Thanks guys.
Likewise, WiiWare and Virtual Console purchases were hardly widespread. The vast majority of Wii titles were purchased physically, as most of the major games weren't even available digitally.
Right now, a lot of digital buyers are under the illusion that they will always have access to their digital purchases and that those purchases will all carry over to future consoles. It didn't help that Sony implied that this would be the case for the PS3 going into the PS4 (in reality, VERY few of the purchases carried over to the PS4).
I've got about 11 digital games on the PS3 that I would deem "irreplaceable" (most of the other PS3 downloadables I bought I've also since acquired on the PC, others like the Sega retro releases can easily be played through emulators), and it strikes me that if I want to keep playing these down the line, I may end up having to jailbreak a PS3 and download it from a ROM size to circumvent the DRM.
That realisation has led me to completely stop buying anything digitally that I intend to keep on the consoles. My last significant digital purchase on the PS4 was probably Child of Light, and that was 2014.
Edited by FilthyAnimal at 08:21:04 01-03-2018 -
As long as you keep the original console, all digital Wii and Wii U purchases remain tied to the console. You might lose access to re-download them, but if you have them downloaded they're not going anywhere. They're not going to magically disappear.
I assumed at least the PS3 would be the same.
Sometimes posts may contain links to online retail stores. If you click on one and make a purchase we may receive a small commission. For more information, go here.
