A Moment of Silence for the ‘Shack’

It’s official. Despite every effort to head it off, including a complete redesign and marketing campaign that included a well received 2014 Super Bowl Commercial, RadioShack is going the way of the saber tooth tiger. They will still be around, but not quite as we remember them nearly a century after opening its first store in Boston to assist Radio Shack (get it?) operators aboard ships in Boston harbor.
The idea of having one place to buy various small electronics became a household concept to Americans in a time before the concept of a PC even came into existence. At their retail height, RadioShack boasted that 90% of the US population lived or worked within minutes of a RadioShack, but that story is done.

What happened to RadioShack? How did a chain store that became THE American brand name synonymous with electronic parts and do-it-yourself gizmo repair fall into such despair? First off, it’s important to remember that RadioShack is in ‘good’ company.
American History is full of example of well-known companies gone bankrupt, each with its own Harvard Business School case study to go with it. Many economists and MBA students will dissect RadioShack’s downfall for years to come.

This writer personally believes that RadioShack fell victim to being a dead weight brick and mortar company in a world where you can have any electronic part shipped to your door.
There just simply wasn’t a need for the amount of inventory kept by RadioShack.

We at LINC Project would like to look back to happier times for our beloved one stop shop. To that end, we invite you to view this wonderful slideshow of RadioShack’s hits and misses over the years.