On Wednesday, 28 February 2018 11:58:57 UTC, Tim Watts wrote:
On 28/02/18 10:59, John Smith wrote:
Looks like Maplin's going down - any regrets? I've found it a bit pricey
in recent years but it's good for kids gifts, cheap batteries, and some
bits you need urgently.

https://www.theguardian.com/business...-business-live




Sadly the market for electronics as a hobby scaled back and changed and
RS/Farnell became available to everyone. Maplin never really found a
good market after that - it was toys and pseudo party/disco stuff (I
expect "real" DJs bought "real" equipment "from" real DJ stores)

With 100% hindsight, I wondered what they should have done? Focussed on
toys and phone and computer accessories (small rather than bulky items)
and run with things like arduinos and Pis when they came along (again
small, not massively high value stock.

They could have run basics like 1/4W resistors, LEDs and stuff from
behind the counter - but run a stock that was optimised for the Pi etc
market?

Although expensive compared to other suppliers some students did want to order from them but when we tried using their website the items kept disapearing from the basket on informing them they said they knew and that the on-line baskets got reset at night so unless we ordered there and then on the same day we'd loss the items. We haven't brought anything from them for about 3 years now.