Talk:RadioShack/Archives/2015

Customer names and addresses

In the eighties, Radio Shack clerks would usually ask for the customer's name and address, and copy it manually. Many customers found this annoying and unnecessary. Around 2000, Radio Shack had a radio commercial lampooning themselves for this annoying practice, and announced they would stop asking customers for their names and addresses. Any more information about this?108.225.17.141 (talk) 00:01, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

The addresses were used to send a monthly sale flyer by mail. There was also a comprehensive fall catalogue distributed to clients in-store. It looks like the annual printed catalogues died circa-2004 from http://www.radioshackcatalogs.com/catalog_directory.html so maybe there was nothing to distribute to that list? 2001:5C0:1400:A:0:0:0:315 (talk) 02:20, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Super Bowl commercial 2014

Could you please list down the characters from the 1980's in the ad? 69.132.34.133 (talk) 23:11, 25 July 2014 (UTC)

From [1] "Hulk Hogan, Alf, Kid 'N' Play, Mary Lou Retton, 'CHiPs' star Erik Estrada and the California Raisins. Jason from "Friday the 13th" and the Chucky doll from 'Child's Play'". From [2], "Hogan, Sgt. Slaughter, Mary Lou Retton (Olympic gymnast), Twisted Sister, Erik Estrada (The Chips star), Kid ‘n Play (the old-school rappers), Devo (The alt band), Slim Goodbody, Alf, Teen Wolf, Chucky, Bubo (the Owl from Clash of the Titans), the California Raisins, Jason Voorhees (from the Friday the 13th), Solid Gold dancer, Slimer (from Ghostbusters) QBert and A Delorean". [3] has a good list, and the spot itself is on Youtube. [4] lists:

Loverboy, "Working for the Weekend" (as background music)

Olympic champion Mary Lou Retton

Jason, Friday the 13th

Kid 'n Play

Teen Wolf (the original, not the current MTV version)

Cliff Clavin (John Ratzenberger) from Cheers

Dee Snider of Twisted Sister

Pro wrestler Hulk Hogan

Frank Poncherello (Eric Estrada), CHiPs

Pro wrestler Sgt. Slaughter

Rock band Devo

Health educator Slim Goodbody

The California Raisins

Bubo, Clash of the Titans

Alf

Arcade adventurer Q*bert

Chucky from Child's Play

The Back to the Future Delorean

and [5] lists Q-Bert, Devo, Dee Snider, Hulk Hogan, Cliff Claven, Jason, Kid N Play, The California Raisins, Bubo, Teen Wolf, Erik Estrada, Back to the Future, Chucky from Child's Play, Slimer from "Ghostbusters" and Mary Lou Retton. 2001:5C0:1400:A:0:0:0:315 (talk) 02:44, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Removal of "Current Event" section and article template

"Current" template tags were removed, even though this article currently contains at least one section describing events trending in the news at this very moment. "Good faith" cited. Why, please? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.118.4.247 (talk) 16:07, 18 September 2014 (UTC)

Why would this store need a "current event" tag? Its business model has not changed in any useful way since it dumped its manufacturing facilities in 1993 and its non-US stores (InterTAN) in 1986. 2001:5C0:1400:A:0:0:0:315 (talk) 02:46, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

Cuecat

No talk about the cuecat or the affectionate term "ratshack" (which later I attributed as cuecatshack when we'd make city wide runs to each store for our weekly dose of cuecats)

Cuecat wasn't made by RadioShack, and wasn't exclusively sold/distributed by them - why would it be mentioned here? - DavidWBrooks 19:21, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

It should be mentioned because of the popularity of the device among shack devotees and the resulting public relations fiasco that resulted when people realized it could be used to gather marketing data from the user base.65.40.11.173 03:41, 3 February 2007 (UTC)burnsie

According to the CueCat article, RadioShack invested $30 million of the total $185 million behind this failed scheme, in addition to their role in distribution. There were RS catalogues which displayed the codes, one of the few adopters of the scheme; [6] cited at [7] identifies it as one of the products which flopped for RadioShack. In addition to the privacy issues, there were many frivolous legal threats against individual software developers who tried to write third-party Linux drivers to use the barcode reader in their own applications... so, instead of supporting the hobbyist, RS is bankrolling a company threatening vexatious litigation against hobbyists - showing itself clearly out of touch with what was once its core demographic. Yes, this merits a mention, cited to the sources already in the CueCat article. K7L (talk) 18:27, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

Things that really need to be mentioned (and a warning)

The California manager lawsuit really needs to be mentioned. Basically what happened is that California law requires that a manager receiving salary spend >50% of their time doing managerial tasks. Otherwise, they are eligible for overtime like anyone else. RS doesn't believe in this. They are essentially over-glorified sales associates and the abundance of official company literature stating as such destroyed their ability to fight the suit effectively.

I concur, you should also mention the national lawsuit and why Lou Provost and David Edmundson were paid off to keep their mouths shut about not paying managers over time. When clearly they were nothing more than key holders. Most of the former top executives in this company are very shady. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.128.238.223 (talk) 14:54, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

In any event, it was settled out of court. And the firm that represented the Cali managers is now suing them as a federal case.

http://www.radioshackclassaction.com/

Secondly, the radioshacksucks.com lawsuit needs to be mentioned as well. RS won that one (unfortunately). The two are somewhat connected because RSS was a big factor in getting word of the lawsuit out.

http://www.poe-news.com/stories.php?poeurlid=31315

Finally, it should be noted that RS has a habit of attempting to silence opposition opinion to them. Judging by what somebody wrote in the layoffs section, it would appear they've already struck this article at least once.

Kensuke Aida 15:43, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

I presume you mean the 2004 lawsuit? There were suits in additional states in 2014; Pennsylvania is in the article, but a few others aren't listed explicitly. K7L (talk) 18:31, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

No citation needed

"Many RadioShack stores still carry products dating as far back as the 1980s. Older RadioShack products feature the old logo, or an older Realistic or Archer brand name. It is not uncommon to see a few generations of packaging variations on slower moving products [citation needed]."

I removed the citation needed tag because this fact does not really need to be cited. If you ask any Radioshack employee they can verify this. If you wish you can use me as a citation since it is very true that product can stay in the stores for a very long time. For an extreme example, in my last store I sold a 160" roof mount antenna that clearly had been in the store since the 70's (no joke).

Additionally I added Voicestar to the list of proprietary brands since it is a Radioshack brand (check the back of the packaging if you doubt me). -[SeXyRed] SeXyRed 20:13, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I suppose the proper way to source this would be to search the web for "RadioShack inventory turnover". It's a common metric for other retail companies, how long does it take to move one entire storeful of merchandise out the door in one store location? Giant Tiger, for instance, is wedging discount stores with mostly food, clothing and housewares into small existing buildings, so they have to turn inventory over quickly - if something was there a couple months ago, it's not there today. It's not a perfect measure, as some common (or perishable) items will go out the door often while that little-used ten megohm 3.14 watt resistor gathers dust in the parts drawer. K7L (talk) 19:31, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

NexxTech?

The article RadioShack should refer to the company in its current state, separate from Intertan. I'm pretty sure NexxTech is an Intertan-only brand, and thus being previously carried by "RadioShack" is false, in its current definition. Only two mentions of NexxTech appear on RadioShack.com, and both refer to an external web site. I've never been to the United States RadioShack, but I've been led to believe working at Intertan it was never carried in the US.

Here they've had NexxTech products for quite some time before July 1, 2005. Centrinos as well. -Blazingluke 09:58, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

Hmm. Lots? Nastajus 06:02, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Lots and lots! Blank media, cheap devices like MP3 players and digital cameras, and cheap speakers as well as others. Blazingluke 12:20, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Well, I'm glad that's all cleared up! -Blazingluke 10:48, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Typical "Made-In-China" garbage-that's what NexxtTech is...

NexxTech is a brand predominantly carried by CircuitCity, due to the situation with TheSource in Canada and other dealings, the perception that NexxTech is a radioshack brand or is sold by radioshack is an erroneous one.Aeonjoey 10:27, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

InterTAN was carrying a fair amount of non-RS merchandise in various markets even before the Circuit City deal in 2004. It's entirely possible that they owned some store brands of their own which were non-Tandy and non-CircuitCity. K7L (talk) 19:25, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:RadioShack logo.png

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shouldn't some delete nazi delete this image by now? Obrez (talk) 00:49, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

I believe that nobody other than me has ever objected to the bots that attempt to get most image files deleted from Wikipedia. The idea that WP is responsible for ensuring that it is free of copyrighted material is ridiculous. Compare with YouTube, which has a policy of promptly deleting copyright material when the copyright holder requests it, and not before. WP has already lost hundreds of images that made it a better resource than it currently is. Nobody seems to care. David Spector (talk) 16:25, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

New Logo

RadioShack is using an updated logo on their webpage: New logo

Can it be added to the article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Codefenix (talk • contribs) 14:30, 10 November 2015 (UTC)