Monthly Archives: March 2015

The end of Radio Shack as we know it?

This is a US-centric post, so apologies to those in areas where this is irrelevant. Our beloved Radio Shack is closing stores, while going through the form of bankruptcy protection that would allow them to downsize and regroup. Alas, this may not be the case at all. Darren Grant, CEO of Tandy Corporation in the UK, had passed along some information about the fate of the US Radio Shacks which sheds more light on what is really happening.

The trademark to Radio Shack may be sold at auction:

He also pointed me to this document that has details on how Sprint is trying to buy it:

https://cases.primeclerk.com/radioshack/Home-DownloadPDF?id1=NzY3NDc=&id2=0

If only we had a White Knight for Radio Shack in the US. Overseas, there had been Tandy stores (rather than Radio Shack, because that name was already taken). The Tandy stores shut down years ago, but in recent history, a new company has started up an online empire based on the classic brick-and-mortar legacy:

http://www.tandyonline.co.uk

Tandy UK today has many of the familiar Radio Shack brands from the past, like Archer. They have gone to original suppliers wherever possible to bring back items that were once lining the walls of Tandy stores over there. They even have items that were eliminated from the still-existing Radio Shacks in America. Plus, they have things like the Raspberry Pi 2 and Adafruit electronics kits.

I sure wish we could see something like this happen in the US.

If you have not visited the Tandy UK website, take a look. It’s what Radio Shack could have done over here.