Word: retail
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Order a round of Dom Perignon. Put on a party hat. Grab a noisemaker. Get ready to shout "Happy Anniversary!" After all, it was just ten years ago that Americans walked into retail stores and saw the first fully assembled personal computers sitting on the shelves, waiting to be taken home and plugged into the socket. It was the beginning of the computer era for millions of people, ranging from sixth-graders learning to log on, to secretaries spinning out reams of letters, to hopeful authors plugging away at their novels on the screen...
...long ago that such a resurgence seemed improbable. In June 1985 Apple laid off 1,200 of its 5,500 workers (the company has since expanded to a work force of 6,500). Retail computer stores suffered a shake-out that forced an estimated 1,600 of them out of business by 1986. California's famed Silicon Valley suddenly felt more like Death Valley to some of its denizens. The problem: most Americans felt no need to spend hundreds of dollars to install computers in their homes, and chief executives of FORTUNE 500 companies began insisting that underlings make better...
Tandy (1986 revenues: $3.3 billion) has become the king of the retail market by selling computers through its chain of 4,798 Radio Shack stores in all 50 states. Tandy Chairman Roach, 48, an outgoing Texan, makes unexpected visits to about 200 stores a year, helping ensure that Radio Shack employees offer courteous and knowledgeable service. Roach's latest mission is to keep business customers happy with machines like the new $2,599 Tandy 4000, while he pumps up efforts in the educational market...
There is nothing to be said for the buildings; the main one is cramped and coarsely detailed, and the retail boutique that fills its entrance makes it feel like a small, sanctimonious department store. But there is no mistaking the patriotic zeal behind it. The project arose from Terra's twofold conviction that American 18th and 19th century art was as good as any in Europe, and that snobbery keeps this from the public, so that Americans do not know their own artistic heritage. The first proposition is flat wrong, granted a few exceptions like Copley, Homer and Eakins...
...because, unlike the traditional houses, the discounters provide no advice or portfolio management. For example, on a sale of 100 shares of a $60 stock, a discounter's commission would be about $50, in contrast to nearly $100 at a full-service brokerage. As a result, the percentage of retail stock transactions placed with discounters has increased from 8% in 1982 to an estimated 22% this year. Most successful is San Francisco-based Charles Schwab, the largest U.S. discounter, whose revenues have gone up from $42.7 million in 1981 to $308.3 million in 1986. Schwab notes that the typical size...