[Coco] Another Radio Shack Article

[Mark J. Blair]

Tandy's original successful foray into computer sales worked because it was a brand new market with no strongly-established competitors. It was possible to try new things with some expectation of success, because the concept of how a computer should look and behave was not yet entrenched in people's minds. Something like an X-Y digitizer with mechanical arms or an electrostatic printer that could only dump the screen contents could sell for a while because they were selling into a vacuum of products and ideas.

Nowadays, the computer market is highly commoditized, and minor innovations usually need to compete with cheap and plentiful established products. The market is much more set in its ways than it was in late 70s and early 80s. The computer market won't ever be quite like it was in the 8-bit days. It will take something entirely new to have that sort of explosion of innovation.

I don't know what might come along that's comparable to the emergence of home computers. Maybe 3D printing could be somewhat comparable in scope? I wonder what the next big thing will be?

Radio Shack does sell a 3D printer, but only online if I'm not mistaken. Their network of brick and mortar stores was a very strong advantage when they introduced the TRS-80, but I don't think that helps them as much now.

Radio Shack was successful in hobbyist electronics because the local Radio Shack store was the go-to place for anything electronic. Major component distributors weren't very accessible to individuals. Now, if you need electronic components the first impulse is to go online to a vendor like Sparkfun or Digi-Key, depending on your experience level and what you're looking for. Radio Shack would need to have a comparable online presence to be a go-to company for hobbyist electronics now, but their web site isn't very good for that sort of thing. It doesn't have a search engine that's geared towards finding components; it's more like a printed catalog that happens to be online.

I hope that Radio Shack can come up with a way to keep their brick and mortar stores relevant and successful, because I do like the instant gratification of browsing items on the shelf and walking out the door with what I buy.

Amazon comes close enough to that instant gratification with their new warehousing and shipping techniques, but their web site's search engine sucks pretty hard. There's not even an AND operator or "find ALL of these words" function, so it can be very hard to find something specific among mountains of irrelevant crap. I think that Radio Shack could carve out a niche and compete against the likes of Amazon if they provided a better online experience. There are relatively few really top-notch tailored search engines out there. Digi-Key comes to mind for electronic components, and McMaster-Carr for industrial supplies and hardware. There have been a number of times that I would have bought something from Amazon, but I ended up going elsewhere (and probably paying more) because finding what I wanted on the Amazon site was too frustrating.

-- 
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/