I don't doubt that they have money in the bank. I remember when an exec was accused of taking money from the company? it was like 75mil. Now if they would just organize their stores....
http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_11290227
If you've ever tried to buy anything at any of their stores, you'll notice you get sales people asking to scan your items and print you a quote. Fry's employees don't actually get paid hourly wages anymore, they need to write up merchandise that customers buy which have a per-item commission attached (generally .50- $5 per item, high margin items might be $5-$15). If an employee doesn't make their weekly minimum wage quota, they go into a debt (minimum hourly wage will be paid, but the difference is made into pseudo-debt), if they don't sell enough to get out of their debt or if they arn't making their large warranty quotas, they will be fired. Apparently Fry's used to offer their employees much better benefits, hourly + higher commissions, and there used to be some sort of "retirement" type bonus system where they earned a growing lumpsum of money that would only be paid out if they stuck with the company for more than 6 years or so, but they've scraped hourly pay for the commission-debt system, removed departments and dropped those employees into sales positions, and generally just cut corners everywhere possible without any real modernization.
Within the last few years they've pushed to match internet prices which is nice if you know their policy (limited list of official retailers, item must be in stock at that time, sometimes they arbitrarily add shipping costs). You'll piss off the sales person that writes you the price matched quote because they'll lose any normal commission. From talking to the employees, it's a toxic work environment and the entire store is feverishly being badgered to meet quotas for warranty sales.
Fry's is a crazy store, it's in a position to be cutting edge for the maker scene where Best Buy, and Radio Shack have failed, but it's still stuck behind 20 years and ridiculously inefficient and short sighted corporatcracy. On that note, if you walk into a home depot you'll probably notice a maker bot demo set up.
(It's still a great place for selection, if you don't count on salesperson knowledge or fast price-matching.)
I don't doubt it per se, I just want to pin down that notion. I find it shocking that they outlived Circuit City and Radio Shack, so I'm beginning to wonder if maybe they're actually profitable and we're just annoyed that their target market doesn't necessarily capture us anymore (the way it did in the 90s and to some extent the 00s in my case).
(note: a descendent comment asking about a Best Buy reference pointed out that I inadvertently said Fry's outlived Best Buy; I meant Circuit City and corrected it, but that may just add more confusion with the resulting conversation)
In the Bay area they have replenished some of their "maker" supplies to be more relevant again but it is spotty. They prefer high margin items like laptops or washer/dryer combinations. This is quite a bit lower than when parts distributors Wyle and Arrow were complaining that Fry's was selling individual parts at the 1K quantity price and cutting off their margins.
They also managed to kill off the electronics stores in the Bay area, Sunnyvale Electronics, Jade Systems, JDR Microdevices, Quement, Quest, Etc. JameCo has survived but in part because they have a decent mail order business and hold the line on their prices. I wrote a letter to Bill Fry complaining because after they killed off those businesses their component supply dropped off dramatically leaving folks in Silicon Valley ordering from a company in Minnesota to get parts they use to source locally.
That said, I find it hilarious when they have in their display case test equipment offered for sale from companies that are no longer in business.
[1] Of course Radio Shack probably cited everything at one time or another as to why they were going out of business.
I'm sure Fry's had a lot to do with it, but a good deal of the problem is that "times are changing".
More stuff gets built exclusively in Asia nowadays, leaving fewer part overruns in the USA that can be sold to surplus companies that used to be in the Bay Area.
As SoCs become more prevalent there is just less need for glue chips. This is all across the board. E.g. 20 years ago every desktop PC needed a graphics card, or at least a graphics chip. But now the vast majority of video needs are satisfied by Intel's on-die graphics. Same with USB, it's in the Intel chipset. No need for SATA cards or chips, it's all in the Intel chipset. So is ethernet. Etc.
Plus in the old days hobbyists had a chance of being able to work with DIP components, or even SOICs. Nowadays the resistors and capacitors are almost too small to see without a stereo microscope. And BGA components can't easily be soldered or reworked without sophisticated equipment.
With more stuff being designed, debugged, and manufactured in Asia, I'm not surprised that Fry's has a lot of older test equipment collecting dust. No demand for it anymore.
We live in interesting times. Sucks for people who used to make a good living in electronics.
Partly it's because a lot of the kids who would have been assembling Heathkits in 1980 are now making minecraft mods.
But even without that, there's been a shift in the electronics market. There are high demand, medium demand, and long tail components. Everyone has the high demand components at home. The long tail components aren't in high enough demand to stock in expensive-to-run high street stores, so they can only be mail ordered. The medium demand components are in between - the range is wide enough that people don't have them all already, but limited enough and in high enough demand that a high street store can satisfy demand and make enough money to stay in business.
30 years ago, medium demand components were things like 7400-series logic chips. Today, microprocessors like the arduino have most of that stuff built in, or can be programmed to do it. Nobody needs to go to the shops because they need a positive edge triggered dual D-type flip-flop and all they have at home is a dual master slave JK flip-flop.
There are like 50 registers and not but a few are ever in use, and it is such a huge store with so many employees I can't understand how they can keep making money.
I remember in the early 2000's there were a lot more discrete electronic components. Last time I went you could still find the soldering irons and oscilloscopes and resistors and such, but it wasn't nearly as impressive. Kind of sad! I guess not as many people do low-level circuits hacking in the age of surface-mount parts and Arduino boards on Amazon...
http://www.amazon.com/Arduino-ARD-NANO30-Nano-v3-0/dp/B003YV...
vs
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Freeshipping-Nano-3-0-control...
You just get them from aliexpress in china, which is where most of these things are made these days anyway.
So yeah, I don't mind paying 5x.
More people are building electronics than ever. But they're not buying from Fry's. Everybody serious gets their parts from Digi-Key and Mouser.
I do wonder what the overall trend is. I mean, it's certainly harder to build anything close to "state of the art" in miniaturization without having a custom PCB fabbed and soldering SMT. And it seems with all the premade building blocks (Arduino shields and such) fewer people would actually need to design from scratch. Also our idea of what's "interesting" has shifted a bit... the radio receiver and burglar alarm and amplifier kits I built as a kid (in the 90's) might not be be as exciting today. But then maybe the maker movement brings an influx of new experimenters regardless. Awesome if so.
And I also don't do hardware hobbyist stuff much anymore so I'm inclined to take your word for it if low-level circuit hacking really is getting popular again :-)
Man, try returning a computer, especially a broken one. A true conversation:
"This system doesn't work."
"Right. That's why I'm returning it."
"We can't take it back if it's not working, it means we can't put it back on the shelf."
Facepalm. And reasoned argument, escalating into rather loud voices until they give me my money back just to get rid of me. Do not ever, ever buy a white box computer at Fry's.
I don't use that CC any more.
As a matter of principle, I always walk directly past receipt checkers at store exits. I've never been stopped, although I've gotten some nasty looks.
I believe that doesn't happen often, so I don't doubt that it hasn't been an issue for you so far, but it doesn't mean it will never be an issue.
Your choice of course.
I've encountered the same receipt-checking at Guitar Center on the rare occasion when I've shopped there, and GC's employees also work on some sort of screwy commission system that at least superficially resembles a sweatshop. I suspect that there are some kinds of fiddles that involve ringing you up for one item and walking you out the door with another.
Is this a relatively recent change? And if not, are you sure it isn't for very specific departments, or certain price points or such? I don't go to Fry's all that often -- Amazon Prime blah blah etc. -- but I never saw them print out a quote sheet unless I did the internet price matching. The most recent purchase I've made there I can confirm is December 2013, though.
That being said, in the sales department we instead just paid everyone remotely the same, no commission on anything. Never was a toxic environment, never was any banter amongst people, and i feel that it def. helps sales due to not overselling shit to people.
Frys is a mess, but so is big box retail.
DEEPSEA / SPACE EXPLORATION get the workers in on that shit lets get off this stupid rock. its fucking about to be 2020 where the hell are the flying cars.
(Dirty, poor displays, a lot of shelf space empty/out of stock, and always almost entirely empty.)
Now you have merchandisers doing the cashier task. And you hardly see a row of cashiers. Even vendors are not happy with Fry's due to late payments.