Is there anything left in Maplins?

[ARW]

Very little when I had a look.

[Scott]

Glasgow, St Enoch had a lot last time I visited.

[michael adams]

Strange.

In three branches in West London I've looked in, they've still got plenty of stock.

Although any real bargains may have been cherry picked

Their windows are plastered with two posters.

"Up to 20% off" and "Everything Must Go".

But as newspaper articles have pointed out even at 20% off, a lot of their stuff is cheaper elsewhere - with sellers who might be able to honour guarantees.

While if it really is "Everything Must Go" no clearance specialist or auction sales would offer them anything anywhere near to 80% retail. So theyl'll have to move on the 20%. off.

michael adams

...

[tabbypurr]

that's true of nearly every 'everything must go' sale. Once once have I seen retail stuff all 90% off. A lot of it still wasn't worth buying.

NT

[Andy Burns]

I've been in two; while buying what I went in for, I trawled the shelves and didn't really see anything else worth buying.

Different types of items were 10%, 20%, 40%

yep

[michael adams]

It may be that they're moving stock out of branches so they end up with maybe a few regional branches acting as clearance outlets with rock bottom prices.

This will then also make it more convenient for clearance people to make them an offer.

michael adams

...

[Andrew]

Even their reduced prices are more than you would pay on the internet.

[Andy Burns]

If I was the boss of CPC, I'd be worried about the proportion of "maplin style tat" in stock/catalogues ...

[spuorgelgoog]

People still buy "maplin style tat", they just don't buy it from Maplin. Just like Woolworths folded because they sold poundshop goods at Woolworths prices.

CPC have their industrial customer backing and they don't have an expensive shops network.

Owain

[Dave Plowman (News)]

I'd guess they've moved stock to shops where they think it will get the best prices quickly.

[Brian Gaff]

So what is occurring here. One might have expected that a company would have bought the lot to make some money. They must surely make money for this by flogging the premises they own. Brian

[Jethro_uk]

I suspect their premises are mainly rented (so a few out of pocket landlords)

[Martin Brown]

I doubt there is much money to make even in a fire sale of their goods.

Mostly rented. It was probably the impending rents at the next quarter day that determined when they went bust.

[Huge]

Saves having to pay someone to take them away.

[Andy Burns]

I suspect they rent most of them ...

[alan_m]

In common with nearly every company, they will not own the premises they are trading from. Even if they did own the headquaters building or a central warehouse mortgaging or selling these off may/will have been the first act of desperation in trying to save the company.

How much would it cost someone buying up the stock to collect all those singly packaged items in the stores, sort them out and then list them separately for re-sale?

I hear, from the owners, that a few recent collapses in food outlets are blamed on low footfall due to Brexit. In reality the businesses were built on shifting sand with borrowing outstripping realistic returns from the business.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

If Maplin can't sell their tat at a profit, why would anyone else be able to?

Most firms in trouble have already sold and leased back. To prevent another asset stripping.

[Jethro_uk]

I do find myself idly wondering at what point the lack of people queueing up to rent such units starts to bite into DTZs or GTAs profits ?

[Jethro_uk]

Speaking for SWMBO and myself, any low footfall is simply down to learning that a lot of shops are for the main - pretty shit.

One thing I *have* noticed is that Sainsburys has become more like Aldi or Lidl, where it's a bit of a lucky dip as to what they are stocking, and how much they have of it. I have still to determine if this is down to some idiosyncrasies with Sainsburys, creeping effects of Brexit, an foretaste of how things will be, or all 3.

[michael adams]

They're still trying to run an online operation of sorts.

A lot of the stuff they're classing as "previously owned" when in fact what they're probably talking about is demonstration or display stock.

So is presumably from various branches.

The big problem they have, is that they can't offer any guarentee - all the website stuff is offered "sold as seen".

Which you'd imagine is enough to put most people off as even if only in theory, buying from Amazon Marketplace or eBay sellers does offer some form of customer protection.

Moneysavingexpert has a page on it

michael adams