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FOPP news

http://www.retail-week.com/nav?page=retailweek.news.detail&resource=6897573

Music retailer Fopp has stopped taking orders online and is only accepting cash payments at its stores.

Fopp posted on its web site: “Due to circumstances beyond our control we cannot currently take orders online. Sorry for any inconvenience caused.” A notice on the tills said it was having problems with “authorisation systems”.

This follows an announcement on Friday that it had closed 50 stores for an extraordinary stock-take, a week after it told publishers to stop supplying new books and replenishments.

looking bad, as far as i can tell. administration at worst, THE MOST AMAZING CLOSING DOWN SALE EVER at best (apologies to those who work/know others who work there...)

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i have never bought anything in fopp so this is my fault

Extensive discussion on ILM. The alleged story told there is that Fopp bought 60+ stores worth of another chain which had gone bust but that chain's creditors have now piled on Fopp. Hence taking cash only, i.e. trying to liquidise only asset i.e. stock.

Seems a bit odd to me to have tried to expand so dramatically in a declining market.

I think they bought a lot of stores from Music Zone...who went bust after over-expanding and buying a load of failing stores from MVC when they went pop! So probably the same ones.

It's a bit of a mess really as Fopp seemed to be doing well up until that point.

Someone on my flist said that Fopp had gone into administration this morning...

And they've since said it's been confirmed. Yes, I agree re the filing system, it was a bit arcane esp wrt "singer/songwriter" vs "classic rock". Now I guess I'll be going to HMV for my pop music needs :(

i'm going to rough trade to buy the art brut albUM RIGHT NOW, as a protest, or something...

I guess there's still Sister Ray as well for the indie-r things...

i can tell u that it has gone into administration on thursday

That would be a terrible shame. I really like Fopp and their left-of-norm stock. And their prices...

I like Fopp but am apt to blame at least part of their troubles on the baroque 'file by genre' system their shops employ. Are My Chemical Romance 'Pop', 'Modern Alternative', 'Rock' or 'Metal'? They could easily fit into any of the above! BUT THEY ARE IN NONE OF THE ABOVE THEY ARE IN THE '£7' GENRE WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME FOPP I HAVE DONE YOU NOTHING BUT GOOD.

I would be unhappy if they closed, though. The sound in the TCR branch is superb, when they have in-stores.

hahaha, JINX! i just said pretty much the same below.

Truth! That's why I file everything alphabetically by FIRST LETTER OF ARTISTS NAME ie ABC, The Album Leaf, Annie, Annie Lennox, The Auteurs. Perfect system established by long-gone chain Andy's Records.

I remember encountering Fopp for the first time visiting byebyepride in Edinburgh and being STAGGERED by how cheap, friendly, un-like a normal record shop it was.

I think I bought too much from it over the years though - it was always a "£3? go on then" kind of a place and I've come to feel that's a crap way to buy music. That wasn't why I stopped going - a certain worthiness crept into their choice of £5 picks so I stopped finding stuff I wanted (lots of "ought to have" but really life's too short) also the Cambridge Circus place always seemed to play REMORSELESSLY miserable and offputting music.

I still really liked the Edinburgh ones whenever I went tho :(

you know what i blame? endless over-classification of the music. where the hell am i going to find, for example, Paul Simon:

classic rock
singer songwriter
pop

WHERE????? what is the problem with a to z by artist????

Ha, jinx...

Can it really be the case that the idea of the new Rough Trade shop is that you go to a shop IN ORDER TO DOWNLOAD STUFF?

What lunacy is this???

I did wonder if this was an indie revival of the "compile your own mix CD" from our catalogue idea that was mooted a couple of years ago and then never seemed to happen.

I've supported this idea for years now! It is potentially good because it maintains the 'sociable' aspect of track hunting in a way that just sitting at home on msg boards doesn't and I like the idea of there being specific places where people could gather to do that kind of thing, hang out, argue, share music etc. and get recommendations from 'actual experts who know their thing'. Internet cafe meets record shop essentially - why not? They should provide CD-R compilations of music pre-permitted by labels/BPI too i.e. 'Instant Collection/Guide To X'

THERE WAS NEVER A SOCIABLE ASPECT OF RECORD HUNTING - total lie, there were rows of men in duffle coats flicking through the racks, occasionally jostling one another, and people behind the counter trying not to catch their eye.

This has always been the most boggling part of the whole "oh the record shop experience is dying noes" argument.

I think we're both generalising here! In my college my vinyl-loving DJ friend and I would go record shopping here and there, talk to the shop owners and all that even tho I wasn't obsessed with the format.

Maybe that wasn't the mode but I'm sure lots of MENG into the same music did that, if the opportunity was there.

When I was in high school, there was a CD shop where I had that kind of thing - it was always kind of empty and the guy there knew lots of stuff that I didn't, so we struck up a reasonable friendship despite the fact that he was probably 10 years older than me.

But that was the time. The rest of the time it was as

freakytigger says, solitary guys intently flicking through racks.

having been to the old rough trade shop (neal street) at lunchtime this sounds ok, rather than:

me: have you got the k'naan alBUM?
RT: cane-an?
me: yeah, somalian rapper dude
RT: taps at computer then disappears out back for two minutes, then reappears with boss looking dude
BD: cane-an?
me: yeah, he was on at glastonbury with the marleys, somalian rapper dude
BD: ah well, we don't really do "world", you wanna try ray's jazz innit

he mayaswell have just said NO BLACK MUSIC HERE, AWAY WITH YOU!!!!

Shockin!

Andy Kershaw is turning in John Peel's grave, or something.

the question 'why DID you go to Rough Trade to buy African hip-hop' is beggable tho to be honest.

i went there to buy white-boy indie, but i'd assumed they'd have the K'naan alBUM too, i mean it's pretty "conscious" (ie for white boys) hip-hop...

Noooooo!!!! Not Fopp!!!

*sobs*

This sucks. Buying music online is just not as much fun. You don't see random stuff and go "ooh, I never realised before but I want that!". Well, I don't anyway.

*struck by sudden horrid thought - prays nothing bad happens to Sister Ray*

This is so sad, Fopp is my favourite place to buy CDs and I love their selections of world cinema, and they sell some good books cheap as well. There are other cool music shops but nowhere else which has the good books and films in the same place, and it's so shiny and nicely laid out. :(

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