R.I.P. Tower Records - TTLG Forums

Risquit on 5/11/2006 at 05:31

As you may have heard Tower is going out of business and their inventory is being liquidated. What a truly sad day for music. I'm really going to miss them. How great was it to be able to get out of your house at 11 pm if you were bored and go CD shopping? Are you downloaders proud of yourselves? And no, online shopping isnt the same!

My official last purchase after more than 20 years: Scott Walker's--The Drift. Amazing album, BTW, disturbing really.

Para?noid on 5/11/2006 at 05:44

Yes what a truly sad day for music

Music has truly died now we can't buy music from a particular record store, you INSANE TWAT?

Aerothorn on 5/11/2006 at 06:01

Tower had it coming.

Ok, I'm gonna do this backwards. First off, the going out of buisness sale was a scam - they hired people to stand on streets with signs saying "up to 30% off!" when the 30% off was only on magazines. More imporantly, they raised prices - the new owners took all the original sales off and therefore turned $12 CDs into $19 ones, all while claiming that "everything must go".

Tower, around here, had okay service and...well, I can't comment on selection, because while 90% of the time they didn't have what I was looking for, I have admittedly obscure tastes. The problem was their prices. No one wants to pay $19 for a CD, or $20 for 2 episodes of The Prisoner. The did MSRP for everything.

At Amazon, for instance, I can get Weird Al's new CD for $13.88. Tower wants to charge me $21 or $22 for it (I can't remember which).

I sympathize with them - the internet changed things and everything. And in some cases, like minature gaming, I'm willing to pay extra to support the store. But there's a difference between paying a little extra and paying twice as much. Tower's prices were simply outrageous - ergo, not enough people bought from them - ergo, they went out of buisness.

Then again, the local Tower donated free gift cards to Roosevelt High School's Asperger's program, so at least they were cool.

Now, Tower Books going out of buisness - THAT was sad.

SD on 5/11/2006 at 06:02

Quote Posted by Risquit

Are you downloaders proud of yourselves?

Out of interest, what was the magic force stopping Tower from opening their own download service until June of this year, a full 5 and a half years after iTunes came into existence?

Failure to adapt = extinction. That there's good old natural selection at work in the marketplace, ladies and gents.

Oh, and as Aero points out, they sold stuff at list price. Good riddance to overpriced retailers I say.

Risquit on 5/11/2006 at 06:05

Its the business model that's dying. Noid, maybe you're too young to appreciate scouring record stores for albums that you've been looking for, or spotting some new box-set or EP or remix or whatever. That experience of looking through a wide and deep selection. Or maybe you still have some big stores in your area (London right?).

But here in San Diego (2.5 million), we're down to a handful of independent stores that are struggling (my friend has owned a metal CD store for years) and the big discount stores with truly dismal selections of top 100 crap. To me, that's sad. Don't have a defense for the high prices except to say that it was a recent phenomenon-a last gasp at profits before sinking. They couldn't match Walmart's pricing power. I understand about markets, and natural selection. That doesn't make it suck any less.

SD on 5/11/2006 at 06:21

Tower weren't an independent though. They had hundreds of stores across a dozen or more countries, and I understand their collapse came about as much as a result of expanding too fast as anything else.

Agent Monkeysee on 5/11/2006 at 08:08

Tower Records didn't have any personality, it was a cookie-cutter chain store like any other. It's like crying that Borders is closing. Who cares.

PigLick on 5/11/2006 at 08:25

man, now that you have a girlfriend, you just aint the same:tsktsk:

Agent Monkeysee on 5/11/2006 at 18:13

ur face :grr:

Para?noid on 5/11/2006 at 18:24

Pig what are you talking about it was golden anti-corporate sentiment

You of all people should appreciate that with your "downtrodden by the man" attitude