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Comment by InTheArena | Hacker News Reader

I was in San Jose, and visited their store there (Which I believe is also their headquarters / central distribution point), and it was just sad. The CPU section / MB was completely bare. I hadn’t heard of what was going on, so I assumed that they were revamping the area or something.

That said, I am not sure we can put the blame only on Amazon. I was in Microcenter the day after, and it was stupid busy - took 30 minutes to check out and was packed to gills. They crammed all of the good stuff of Frys into a much smaller space - mostly focused around PC electronics.

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Microcenter is a great counterexample. The one here in Denver is always full of customers, and it's stuffed with all manner of computer parts, hobby electronics, and so on. It's how I too remember Fry's being back in the day.

I don't really understand how Microcenter does it, but they often have equal or better prices than Amazon, and in any case, they'll price-match. Also, there's no worry about whatever I buy turning out to be counterfeit.

The one slightly odd thing about the Microcenter experience is how all of the salespeople have little stickers to take credit for when they help a customer find something. Are they on commission? Is this Microcenter's way of identifying the most useful floor staff? They're never pushy about it, but it does stand out in stark contrast to pretty much every other retail shop I can think of.

It definitely provides a incentive for sales people to be well informed. I’ve never found that to be the case at Frys.

It's been a long time since I was in a Fry's, but at least at the Austin location, whenever I talked with a salesperson and decided to buy something (hard drivers, processors) they'd print up something for me to take to the cashier along with the product. I always assumed this was for commission purposes.

Yes. It's called a "quote".

I've never heard of microcenter or their sticker system but I'm curious. Does the customer get given stickers that they award to staff or does this happen at checkout or what is it?

Sales people put their barcode on items after they help you to get the commission for selling them.

Fry's does this by printing "quotes" that you take to the register.

Fry’s have always had the stigma that they hired unknowledgeable floor staff. If you knew what you were after you were fine. On the non technical side, half the time the staff didn’t know where to find items and would take you on wild goose chases.

The stock was better than Microcrocenter or Central Computers (when they were relevant), and their sandwiches weren’t held bad. But the floor staff and that stupid thing where they have people at the exits pretend to check receipts on the purchase side. On the return side it was just awful. Today in age their return policies are just bad. On some items they have restocking fees.

To be fair lots of places have restocking fees on various items due to the nature of “renting”.

I find central computers is often staffed with people that are less than personable.

If you knew what you were looking for and could find it without the dread label that indicated that it was re-sealed, opened box product that is...

I’ve bought resealed items from Fry’s. So long as I can take a peek and make sure it’s all in there, I’m okay with that. I’m kinda upset they charged someone 15% restock and turn around and charge me full price, but materially if there is no difference in contents, I don’t care about the packaging.

Packaging isn't a concern. To put something back on the shelf, they should not only make sure the contents are complete and not physically damaged, but actually working.

Anecdotally speaking, I had a high rate of those items not working and had to return them myself. So while all the parts were typically there and the devices powered on, the product often times didn't work. I finally concluded that they likely didn't differentiate returns that were caused by the customer changing their mind vs. customers claiming the stuff didn't work... or that the only check they made for "not working" product was a simple power on type test; given the quality of staff and costs of doing any thing more probably made it difficult to do better (maybe they didn't have good vendor return terms, good vendor allowances, etc. ... who knows) Again, my experience, but I felt like I was playing for slot machine odds when I bought those products... your mileage may have varied.

I stopped shopping there years ago because the quality of the experience and that I didn't trust the open box product and wasn't sure I could reliably get unopened product... the trip to the store just wasn't worth the aggravation. I think that must have been before the restock fees as I don't recall ever having that issue myself (those the returns process was not exactly fun). I did like the store theming, particularly in the Southern CA stores (which is where I shopped them the most).

  full price

I've never seen a restocked item priced at more than 90% of never-opened price, and their prices drop every week or two until sold

They never charge to return anything within the 15-30 days period.

http://homepage.smc.edu/engfer_mark/frys.htm

If you ever do visit a Fry's again, the trick for that "let me check your receipt and mark it with a pink sharpie" person is to just smile and walk right by. They won't stop you or question you, because they have been trained that it would be unlawful to do so. They can ask to see your receipt and check it, but they can't demand it.

More than once there has been a line of a half dozen people at the pink sharpie exit, and I've just walked on by, much to the amazement of the people waiting in line.

Note: I'm talking about Fry's, not Costco. I'm told Costco is different because it's a membership club and you have to agree to their terms and conditions to shop there. (I'm also told that even Costco can't demand to see your receipt, but they can cancel your membership if you don't show it.)

>even Costco can't demand to see your receipt, but they can cancel your membership if you don't show it

How does Costco figure out which membership to cancel? Surely they don't detain you if you refuse to show your receipt.

I must confess ignorance on this, I am only reporting what I heard and most likely misunderstood!

Pretty quick to watch the tapes and see what register you bought from. You have to scan membership id at checkout, so then seeing whos membership was used is simple.

Fry's isn't staffing that station anymore, so problem solved...

Did that in past. Guy started freaking out. Supervisor had to calm him down.

Current nearby Frys plays dirty. Has a severely physically disabled guy checking receipts.

Yea. Total guilt trip for not letting him mark receipt.

  they hired unknowledgeable floor staff

In some areas, yes, like anywhere else. For a counterexample, the female manager(?) in Components in Sunnyvale has an almost encyclopedic knowledge of everything in the department.

The receipt-check theft-deterrence theater is annoying. I never wait for it.

  Today in age their return policies are just bad.

Oh, I disagree. As long as you keep proof of purchase (which can be as minimal as saving the invoice number), return friction within 15 days is as low as Costco... and they usually make reasonable extensions beyond 15 days ("I missed the rebate period").

I remember when Microcenter in Santa Clara started exhibiting the same visual decline as described here about Fry's.

> all of the salespeople have little stickers to take credit for when they help a customer find something

I was in Fry's recently and they seemed to do the same thing. After asking for some help they asked me to print a "quote," which meant printing out a receipt at a kiosk on the sales floor with their name. They pulled it up when I checked out. I kind of understood what they were doing, but the process seemed a bit awkward--especially when my question was more along the lines of, "Do you have more stock in the back? When you do you think you'll have more?"

I was going to make the same comment. After recently revisiting my old home in Minneapolis, I had a need for something and the local Microcenter was significantly improved in the few years I'd been gone. Hobby electronics had 4x the shelf space and everything seemed a little better packed and organized.

Compare that with an experience searching for CA glue accelerant (a pretty standard item I had seen at Fry's before) had me driving to three separate stores, finding nothing, and locating a model shop nearby just before close, a several hour ordeal.

It is not hard to compete with Amazon. Having reliable stock I can go out and grab today has huge value. I don't want to delay my project by a few days (or because weekends, a whole week) waiting for Amazon shipping and having to spend the additional effort trying to make sure I don't buy cheap knockoffs (or wondering if what I got was a cheap knockoff)

I think Fry's in the bay area are suffering from high labor and real estate costs.

Once online shopping with 2 hour delivery becomes more ubiquitous it's going the be harder to be a brick and mortar store

Two hour delivery is expensive, and online stores are much harder to search and navigate than well-stocked brick&mortar (it's not impossible to do, but nobody does it).

In the end the cost for the person to pick up and deliver an item on demand like that goes somewhere and that in particular is something that doesn't scale away. The margin improvement from having a warehouse instead of a box store won't make up for that last mile delivery charge, especially when the box store can do the same kind of delivery and benefit from impulse or high margin items from in person shoppers.

Amazon is like wading through sewage to find what you want, and rarely if ever do you find something you weren't already explicitly looking for.

I completely agree with your point about brick and mortar stores. Having a showroom with multiple sizes and brands of product on display, and able to purchase on the spot is a great convenience over waiting for an item to ship. Yes, its a slight inconvenience to commute to and from the store, but it often beats waiting multiple days for something, and having no idea of its quality (or worse if you accidentally purchased a counterfeit product). After doing that a few times on Amazon, and having an issue with a return once, I have stuck to supporting B&M retailers, especially those like Micro Center who provide online stock numbers, indicate where a product is located in their showroom, and match prices (though I have mostly found Micro Center's prices to be the cheapest).

Frys offers same day delivery for free, with orders over $49...

https://images.frys.com/art/deals/tralfaz/Free_Local_Deliver...

Once B&M stores offer same day delivery its going to be hard to be an online store.

I've been going to Microcenter in cambridge MA for years. They've got a decent selection (If you need it they'll likely have something that fits the bill) and decent prices.

They're always changing though: they had a console video game section for a while, now thats hobby computers (rasbery pi and co). They had a camera section, but thats gone. Computer books, gone. So they seem to be paying attention and a few years back they finaly went to a one line checkout (still takes too long, but its better).

> I've been going to Microcenter in cambridge MA for years. They've got a decent selection (If you need it they'll likely have something that fits the bill) and decent prices.

This wildly depends (for that store, at least)--if you need something very mainstream you'll find it but they don't have a lot of things that I'd consider pretty obvious for a tech store. Their computer cases, for example, are mostly X-TREME in nature and they have few-if-any HTPC cases at any given time, and definitely nothing that can rack.

On the other hand, what I do really like about them is that they sometimes, for high-demand items, don't actually update the online stock numbers. I was able to walk into the store to pick up some RAM and walk out with a 3900X because they were saving them for in-store customers.

>Their computer cases, for example, are mostly X-TREME in nature and they have few-if-any HTPC cases at any given time, and definitely nothing that can rack.

Cases that aren't designed to appeal to 12 year old boys are hard to come by, period. Manufacturers have decided that everything needs to have sexy angry facades and RGB lights - this has a lot more to do with product people at the manufacturers and less to do with the actual market. Ditto motherboards, especially.

Motherboards I'll give you, but Silverstone, Cooler Master, and Fractal Design all have plenty of simple and normal models. (This list brought to you by looking around my office.)

It would be nice to not have to wait for Amazon to get something for a project, is all.

I would guess that gamers are by far the largest market for home-built PCs these days. Most people see no need to build from scratch.

I completely agree with you about Micro Center frequently changing. I remember when visiting their SoCal store, the books section was moved to what appeared to be a clearance area and found a large drone display in its place. The Fry's in my area seemed like it had 2-3x the square footage, but maybe the same amount of inventory (or less) than Micro Center did.

The Micro Center also used to have this awesome display of old logos (such as the rainbow Apple logo, Compaq, Packard-Bell, old Microsoft logo, etc) from various hardware and software companies that wrapped around the front and sides of the building in all its 90s glory. Sadly, I found it missing as of earlier this year. I wish I took a picture of it while it was still up. Did the Cambridge store have a similar "logo ribbon"?

I remember those, the one in Tustin also had pictures of industry luminaries (RMS, Bill Gates, Grace Hopper, Steve Jobs, Woz, etc) inside, posted high on the walls around the edge of the building.

Just going there takes me back to the proper “computer stores” that ceased to exist after the 90s. Actual PC parts and not full of appliances and movies/music

No logo ribbon..

frankly a boring looking store

https://www.google.com/maps/@42.3574429,-71.1149978,3a,75y,1...

> I think Fry's in the bay area are suffering from high labor and real estate costs.

Given how long they have been in the bay area they should already be owning most of their real estate.

Taxes and foregone opportunity are still costly, even if you own the real estate outright.

Luckily California has Prop 13 which could have capped their property taxes if they owned the property.

Thats because all this thought that Frys was a victim to Amazon is complete bollocks. Every Frys Ive been in since 2010 has been poorly stocked and full of employees who know absolutely nothing about what they are selling... You go into MicroCenter - Every Single Time - Stocked to the teeth with everything you wanted and a bunch of things you didnt even know you wanted - and the folks who work in the store are super nerds, who impress you with the depth of their nerdiness. Worst part is the 30 minute+ line to check out around Christmas.

My last Fry's trip, coincidentally at the Palo Alto store, I was searching for an 2-3ft HDMI extender, female to male. I figured since this was for connecting to a Raspi, I should start there. Plenty of small HDMI cables, but no dice.

I happened upon another isle with 100m cables, by the ethernet cables, but a bit of searching saw they were not there.

Lets check out the computer area, I see tonnes of options, search through them all, can't find it. break down and ask a guy, after much confusion he hauls be back to the raspi section. i told him I've already looked there.

I walk back and see the tv/video section, of course, lots of high-end cables but no extender cable. Ask a guy, do you even have these? He shrugs, asked me if I looked through the computer section, I said yes, and I already looked in components. He started arguing with me that they didn't have ANY HDMI-anything there. "Why would you think they were there?!?!"

Finally as I'm walking away, I spot some random sub-section of the tv isle. And around 8 cables there, I look over, there's one that's 5m long, weighs what seems to be 10lbs and cost $30. And I got my 10k steps in.

OMG you are describing my most recent visit to the Palo Alto Fry's. I needed some kind of USB cable, I don't remember exactly what it was. Nothing unusual, maybe an A to C, or an A to B Minor, or whatever.

I asked when I walked in and they said "yes, look in aisle Foo". No luck, so I asked there. "Oh, you should check aisle Bar".

Nothing there either, but the person in that aisle helpfully directed me to aisle Fizz. No luck there, but the person said "you might try aisle Buzz."

And there was yet one more aisle after that.

Yes, they had five different aisles with various selections of USB cables, many of them overlapping but a few different ones in each location.

In the end, I had no luck finding what I needed - and I'd really hoped to get it on the spot to use for a project that evening.

So I walked out a bit disappointed and spent two minutes on Amazon, ordered the exact cable I needed, and had it the next day.

But the exercise of walking around the store was worth it!

The Palo Alto location has a very strange organization. I can't even describe what is wrong with it, but nothing is ever where I think it will be.

I wouldn't blame Amazon at all. Long before they had any impact on my tech buying habits I had already switched entirely to Newegg. Newegg was the best place to shop for computer components by far during the 2000s. They had the perfect mix of good selection, good community (ie. high quality reviews), great return policy, etc. It was only after they added 'partners' and were bought out that they started going down hill.

You got me excited for a minute thinking there was a Micro Center in the Bay Area that I didn’t know about, but Maps still shows the nearest one as Denver. Darn :)

When I moved here I was really surprised that I couldn’t find a store with the selection and prices of Micro Center in SV of all places.

That used to be Fry’s.

No, that was MicroCenter, in the West end of Mercado. There has never been a Santa Clara Fry's Electronics. All 3 Sunnyvale locations were around Lawrence (Lakeside, Kern, now Arques).

Back in the time period this story is about there was a Micro Center in Santa Clara, off of Great America Parkway & 101 on the left in the shop center that now has the movies and In-and-Out. I lived near there (almost in the middle between the Micro Center and the Sunnyvale Frys). At the time the Frys was much cooler, with more kit and better prices. You could get anything at Frys at the time. CPU, RAM, latest SciFi book, tee shirts, heck I remember getting cereal and milk at Frys once.

There used to be one near the Mercado 20 off 101, but that got closed years ago when their rent got too high.

Central Computer is also pretty good, but the one in Sunnyvale burned down. I hope they rebuild it.

They won't be rebuilding the old location on El Camino, but instead are opening a new location near 101 and Lawrence:

https://www.centralcomputer.com/sunnyvale-store

Right next to St. John's!

...near where the old Fry's was, and down the road from the current Fry's. (Which is dying.)

There's a slightly closer one down in Tustin, CA.

Either way, it's incredibly disconcerting. Buying things online should be a choice, not an obligation.

Won't be the first time. People used to live in towns too small to support specialty shops, and either the general store has something, you make one yourself, or you mail order it from Sears and wait weeks.

I think what changed is the speed of shipping. Retail only adds value if there's a more convenient local warehouse, or you trust the salesman.

Buying things at all is a choice.

This is just my anecdotal experience but the Fry's Electronics stores in Texas are way better than the ones in California. They are better stocked, better cooled, and have nicer cafeterias.

There’s also Monoprice.

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