Earlier this year, Circuit City announced a handful of
store closings in the United States along with 60 more in Canada. Today electronics retailer CompUSA is following suite, but more drastically. The company announced that it is closing
126 stores nationwide (DOC) leaving just 109 stores in 39 states and Puerto Rico.
"Based on changing conditions in the consumer retail
electronics market, the company identified the need to close and sell stores
with low performance or non-strategic, old store layouts and locations faced
with market saturation," said CompUSA CEO Roman Ross. "The process
began last week with the closing of four CompUSA stores and over the next 60-90
days."
The company will receive $440 million USD in cash to
facilitate the restructuring. According to the Houston
Chronicle, the cash will come from its parent company U.S. Commercial
Corp. which is controlled by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim.
In Texas alone, CompUSA will close seven out of nine stores
in and around Dallas, Texas. New Jersey will see 10 out of its 11 total stores
fall by the wayside and six of the seven CompUSA locations in Massachusetts
will be shuttered.
The increasingly cut-throat electronics arena has taken its
toll on CompUSA. Its more nimble rivals like Best Buy and Circuit City have
made greater strides in maintaining up-to-date stores and adapting to changing
market conditions and consumer tastes.
CompUSA locations like the one in Skokie, Illinois have the following
phone recording for customers calling in, "Thank you calling CompUSA
Skokie. Please join us for the store closing sale in progress. Call as
at 1-800-COMP-USA or visit us on the web at www.compusa.com. We look
forward to serving your technology needs."
CompUSA also came
under fire in recent years for its mail-in rebates attached to many of its
products. The company received number complaints from consumers nationwide who
reported unfulfilled rebate requests and deceptive advertising practices. The
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) came down hard on CompUSA and its rebate
practices issuing a number of changes that had to be made to ensure that the
rebate process was made easier and less treacherous for the consumer.
The resulting system that rose from the FTC's probing was CompUSA's eRebates program. Under the
program -- which is slightly more complex than Staples' Easy Rebates program – users
can enter in their receipt information online to submit a rebate. UPC codes and
receipts are not required to be mailed in and the process is completely
electronic and relatively trouble-free.
To see if locations in your area will survive or be closed
due to restructuring, you can follow
this link. If your location is not shown in the list of stores, it will be
closed within the next 90 days.