Oh, Monseur le Fopp, you are really spoiling us...

i mean that it was opened since then. Someone said it hadnt been open since last week.

Fopp is a privately owned company - ltd company, Gordon Montgomery is the main shareholder.

I would say the Fopp brand is much stronger than MVC or Music Zone - a shrewd private equity company may be willing to take a majority ownership stake in Fopp - for a significantly reduced price - if it can be agreed with the administrators / existing Fopp private share holders.

Would Gordon Montgomery want to give up that ownership for the sake of the survival of the company that he has built up over 26 years? He would have reduced ownership and control, and in theory would have to work on behalf of the new private equity investors?

stirmonster, was Gordon Montogery the red haired guy that used to work in A1 sounds (and presumably owned it too)?

he sure was. he was a pretty nifty jazz dj too. his brother in law was terry hall. i am a mine of useless gordon montgomery factoids.

haha, i loved that store.

it was the best record store glasgow ever had (probably).

It was closed on Friday, Saturday, Tuesday and Thursday when I passed. It may well have been open on Monday but it seems a bit odd if it was.

xp to pfunkboy

I think it was monday my mate emailed to say he was in it. he said he was hoping to get some cds in a closing down sale but everything was normal. he didnt buy anything.

I tracked this personal account about the circumstances at FOPP

http://www.the-engine.net/forum/?webtag=ENGINE&msg=9753.1

...but the third largest record chain went out of business today, the day before they were due to pay their staff, after stringing them along for a week or so.
All of this comes via my girlfriend, who worked for them, but this'll certainly have a lot more info than anything else currently online........

Glad I bought them stooges CDs yesterday.

RIP Fopp. The best record store Leamington Spa ever had for sure. This stinks.

inside info on the Plan B forum:

Fopp Closing Down?
http://tinyurl.com/36lqd5

another update by The Times: 29th June

Fopp in talks with bankers after music stores close
http://tinyurl.com/39jzn2

Fopp, one the country’s biggest music store groups, is preparing to appoint Colin Dempster of Ernst & Young as administrator as it warned some staff not to expect their monthly pay

the man that will try to save Fopp:

Colin Dempster, Ernst & Young, Corporate Restructuring
http://tinyurl.com/2kq4mw

It's over for FOPP, I am told.

well thats it for bristol then.
nothing left now that all the indies were run out of town.
just crappy HMV (for a few more months) and Virgin.
oh and Woolies of course.

The 184,000 profit on 40 mill turnover posted upthread I can believe -- the Fopp business model has presumably always operated on low margins, and obviously the only way to grow a business like that is to take a little bit of money in a lot of places, hence I can see why expansion might be attractive, esp. if you thought you would be dancing on the grave of HMV / Virgin. But can't see this business being attractive to anyone else, particularly.

Maybe successful stores will continue if chain is broken up?

swallowing the higher than expected debt of MVC (£20million+ according to one person in the know) was the killer.
sounds like someone did some clever accouting during the MVC deal and now Fopp (and its staff of course) are paying the price.

So, what do we do now?

Returning to the original 'question', are we spoilt now? Heck, I did wait for those Nick Drake 'new' cds to come out at a cheap price. In truth, I was even planning to wait for the new 'family tree' to do the same. But, what do we do now? Stump up? Or end up saying "Actually, I didn't really need it anyway" and go along not thinking about it, like Baloo says.

So, I have a reasonably decent backlog of stuff I haven't quite played enough, some not played at all yet.

For opening up and bucking the trend of selling CDs cheaply without selling pure quizi-hallmark crapola, against the trend of 'all sales to centre on downloads', we thank ye.

So, are they open today or not? And does us circling like hawks waiting for panic sales help or hinder their cause?

Should think they'll be shut. If you worked there and found out you weren't gonna get paid, would you turn up for work?

If I was in charge of marking down sale stock, which I could then purchase with a staff discount, yes.

pour out a 40

which I could then purchase with a staff discount, yes

Fuck the purchase option, if I was losing a months wages I'd be taking my wages in box sets and dvds.

exactly. staff discount LOL.

(too honest for own good)

But anyway, if you can mark down a box set to £2, why not?

This is all a bit unworthy. I hope the administrators can keep at least some stores going.

This all makes me want to open a record store, strangely. How hard can it be? Finsbury Park needs one!

This all makes me want to open a record store, strangely. How hard can it be? Finsbury Park needs one!

Indeed it does! You know the hairdresser (or is it a minicab office now - i left FP 9 months ago and my memory is fading) at the bottom of Stroud Green Road, just before the bridge by the tube - the one that looks like its in a garden shed? A secton of that used to be record shop! A tiny one selling reggae and a bit of hip ho - closed about 3 years ago. Considering the large AfroCaribbean community, I'm suprised that didn't survive.

Yeah I know where you mean. I never went in, though.

also Fopp opened a new Fopp store in Cumbernauld earlier this month.

Opening a record shop in Cumbernod? No wonder they've went out of business!

Did they get John Gordon Sinclair and Clare Grogan to open it?

just got this press release:

'It is with great regret that we announce the closure of Fopp.

Our store chain is profitable, well regarded and loved by our loyal customers and staff. However we have failed to gain the necessary support from major stakeholders, suppliers and their credit insurers to generate sufficient working capital to run our expanding business.

We would like to thank staff and customers for their support over the past 25 years'

ENDS

A fopp spokesperson

It's the Day the Music Died

I'm actually quite stoked about this.

What, about several hundred people losing their jobs? Not a cause for celebration, surely...

As it was the only shop (about from...cough...IKEA) that I couldn't leave without having purchased several items I'm annoyed that they seemed to have cocked it up with the purchase of MVC/whatever the hell it was called. Godammit I HATE going in HMV or Virgin.

xpost. Well it would have been less people if they hadn't decided to go on an expansion rampage while their business was already failing, opening shops all over the shop while their existing ones weren't even viable.

That's not those staff members' fault though, is it?

xpost. Well it would have been less people if they hadn't decided to go on an expansion rampage while their business was already failing, opening shops all over the shop while their existing ones weren't even viable.

-- jim, Friday, June 29, 2007 6:43 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

fewer. why are you 'stoked' though? you were personally offended by fopp's expansion?

"Disaster for Scotland!"*

(obscure 70's football references-R-us)

xpost. Aye.

Profitable - yes. But at 4.6% of revenue, no-one would be interested in putting money into this as an investment.

They could of course get VC and change strategy, but they would need to avoid a strategy that brings them into direct conflict with HMV. They'll lose that battle.

Everyone I know who uses Fopp pretty much only buys cheapo items - they would need to find a way to subsidise that by selling more close-to-full-price product. Their marketing strategy was pretty naive - you can use the bargain basement strategy to gain share, but pretty soon you need to change tack to start making some money. They never got to the making money stage, yet foolishly expanded at a rate that their cash flow couldn't support.

Their stores were laid out pretty badly (for them) - lots of cheap CDs near the door and on big displays, but few incentives to buy more expensive items i.e buy this CD for £10 and get another for £4.

They never got to the making money stage, yet foolishly expanded at a rate that their cash flow couldn't support.

I'm sure the first few stores made money.

They did perfectly well for 15-20 years or so

Sad to think that there were four record shops in Byres Road and now there's only Lost in Music left.

Making enough money (to expand as they wanted).

Yes, they did well until they tried to expand too fast. One bad decision.

employees not paid this month = sadface

That's exactly what I said exactly one week ago! (xp)

I would have thought that there is no way out of this, unless they can sell off a lot of newly acquired stores and some of the least successful old stores. They would have to then start again with a core of stores and a new strategy. I'd say it's viable, but of marginal interest to investors.

if their store chains are "profitable" then not paying their employees for a month of work is surely against the law?!!