The End of an Era: Discontinued products, services, and defunct companies

[Owain Taggart]

Canadian Toys R Us never actually went away. (Although I guess that may be changing soon if they're not doing that great?)

Yep, exactly. They are a different company altogether, and they were doing much better financially. When the American company went bankrupt, the Canadian company was actually doing well enough to offer to buy the American company to keep it going, but they had declined, and shortly after I remember hearing about popup stores appearing in the US, followed by smaller scaled-down revamped stores concepts. And meanwhile the Canadian stores had never gone away and were plodding along, until now it seems.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Do they still have A&W roadside drive-ins? I miss those.

And King's Food Host, with the little jukeboxes at every table.

 

[BK613]

Fry's Electronics
LAN support in PC games
ISPs with newsgroup servers.

 

[DarrenTR1970]

The last Sears store in Washington State will close its doors December 15th. That leaves nine left in the United States.

 

[DarrenTR1970]

Do they still have A&W roadside drive-ins? I miss those.

And King's Food Host, with the little jukeboxes at every table.

I remember eating at an A&W Drive-Thru just outside of the Northern entrance to Yellowstone National Park in Montana in the late 90s.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

ISPs with newsgroup servers.

Oh hell yeah. I absolutely miss Usenet. Those were some good times.

 

[Avro Arrow]

The last Sears store in Washington State will close its doors December 15th. That leaves nine left in the United States.

Sears officially ended operations here in Canada in January 2018. I miss them. I used to love their clothing sales.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

I miss their catalogues.

 

[Owain Taggart]

Do they still have A&W roadside drive-ins? I miss those.

No more drive-in style A&Ws here in Canada, but I'm sure you've noticed in your visits how A&W is a big thing here. Would consider them to be in the top 3 fast-food chains in Canada.

 

[DarrenTR1970]

I miss their catalogues.

I can't remember what game show I was watching on BUZZR the other day, but one of the parting gifts was a year subscription to the SEARS catalogue.

 

[DarrenTR1970]

No more drive-in style A&Ws here in Canada

Here in the Puget Sound, they're paired with either Taco Bell or Kentucky Fried Chicken.

 

[Owain Taggart]

Here in the Puget Sound, they're paired with either Taco Bell or Kentucky Fried Chicken.

I've never actually eaten at a Taco Bell, mainly because there aren't many of them locally, and I don't think they're too popular here as a result. Closest one is at a mall food court. And I'm not too crazy about KFC.

 

[DarrenTR1970]

There was a store here in the Puget Sound in the late-60s through the early-80s called 'JAFCO' - which is kind of hard to describe. The front of the store was the showroom with all the electronics (TVs/Radios/Hi-Fi Systems/Record Players/etc.) being "display only".
You would fill out a slip of paper of the item you wanted, hand it to an employee, who would take the carbon to the back of the store, to the warehouse, where that person would put it on a cart and wheel it out to the check-out register.
We also had a discount chain called 'Wig Wam' that was an Army-Navy Surplus store here as well. It also went belly-up in the early-80s​

 

[DarrenTR1970]

I've never actually eaten at a Taco Bell, mainly there aren't many of them locally, and I don't think they're too popular here as a result. Closest one is at a mall food court. And I'm not too crazy about KFC.

We have a local fast-food chain here called 'Taco Time' that is a heck of a lot better than 'Taco Hell'. It's a little pricier, but the portions are more generous.
Our local fried chicken chain 'Ezel's' is also better than KFC. Again, it's pricier, but the portions are more generous.

 

[DarrenTR1970]

We used to have a fast-food seafood chain called 'Skippers' that was really good. The last one in Wenatchee closed a few years ago.​

 

[Firebird]

I've been missing at least one or two companies or services since 2009. I probably miss Suncoast Video most of all.

I still have a near-complete set of Tenchi Muyo VHS tapes that I bought from the blowout sale when my Suncoast closed eons ago. I miss that place so much.

 

[Colonel Midnight]

There was a store here in the Puget Sound in the late-60s through the early-80s called 'JAFCO' - which is kind of hard to describe. The front of the store was the showroom with all the electronics (TVs/Radios/Hi-Fi Systems/Record Players/etc.) being "display only".
You would fill out a slip of paper of the item you wanted, hand it to an employee, who would take the carbon to the back of the store, to the warehouse, where that person would put it on a cart and wheel it out to the check-out register.
We also had a discount chain called 'Wig Wam' that was an Army-Navy Surplus store here as well. It also went belly-up in the early-80s​

That JAFCO store sounds a lot like the ‘Service Merchandise’ store near me in the ‘80s… wonder if it’s a predecessor?

Cheers,
-CM-

 

[Nerys Myk]

I miss their catalogues.

Yeah The Wish Book. Sears was where we went when I was kid. Crazy Xmas displays

 

[Avro Arrow]

There was a store here in the Puget Sound in the late-60s through the early-80s called 'JAFCO' - which is kind of hard to describe. The front of the store was the showroom with all the electronics (TVs/Radios/Hi-Fi Systems/Record Players/etc.) being "display only".
You would fill out a slip of paper of the item you wanted, hand it to an employee, who would take the carbon to the back of the store, to the warehouse, where that person would put it on a cart and wheel it out to the check-out register.

That JAFCO store sounds a lot like the ‘Service Merchandise’ store near me in the ‘80s… wonder if it’s a predecessor?

We used to have a store around here called "Consumers Distributing" that worked the same way, but it wasn't just electronics, it was all sorts of merchandise. My mom used to take us there as kids. You would walk in, and there would be tables with their catalogues on them. You would go through the catalogue, fill out a paper with the item numbers of the things you wanted, then take it to the desk, and they would go and bring you all your items.

I just checked online, it looks like they declared bankruptcy and shut down in the mid 90s.

 

[Owain Taggart]

We used to have a store around here called "Consumers Distributing" that worked the same way, but it wasn't just electronics, it was all sorts of merchandise. My mom used to take us there as kids. You would walk in, and there would be tables with their catalogues on them. You would go through the catalogue, fill out a paper with the item numbers of the things you wanted, then take it to the desk, and they would go and bring you all your items.

I just checked online, it looks like they declared bankruptcy and shut down in the mid 90s.

Yeah, I remember Consumers Distributing. The one downfall with that model is having to go in and find out that they're out of whatever you want until you put in your order after filling in your order form, because you wouldn't know otherwise. I remember all too many times the feeling of dejection upon being told they don't have that item.

FWIW, The Beer Store started this way using a similar model, where you'd go up to the counter and a clerk would go out in back and grab you a case of beer. And as far as I know, some stores still do use that model, though most have long since been converted to stores with an open floor plan full where you can browse for what you want.