[Closed] If you have an HMV Gift Card Spend it today

Last time they were bought out by Hilco, the business turnaround specialists; with their track record and expertise, if HMV are on the brink again I would say they're finished.
It's also another nail in the high street coffin.
Mike Ashley talked sense when he advocated 20% tax on online retailers - not that they are the main reason for HMV's troubles.

Mike Ashley talked sense when he advocated 20% tax on online retailers – not that they are the main reason for HMV’s troubles.

The UK property market is dysfunctional (as much for the high street as for those trying to get on the housing ladder), adding costs to other businesses does not fix the core problem. The UK (and maybe the whole world) need to adjust societal relationships with property, property value as investments is damaging them as homes and places of work.

Mike Ashley talked sense when he advocated 20% tax on online retailers – not that they are the main reason for HMV’s troubles.

LOL I'm sure he had a reason to penalise his competition in the bargain basement crap market, looking at recent failings HMV? Huge stock levels, low margin on a product that doesn't need to physically exist. Evans - stripped to the bone by the actual owners, many more.

It's a complex set of issues going on there, if everyone who has an HMV voucher heads in today it will probably finish them off.

Not particularly complex, no one buys CDs or DVDs any more. Ironically, the little Indy vinyl store seems busier than HMV.

My point was more on the high street in general, yep HMV is the dinosaur in the middle there with some fairly obvious issues facing it. TBH amazed they are actually still there.

I wondered how long it would before ubiquitous mike piped up.
Ashley's 20% tax proposal for online retail would also affect his own business - as he clearly stated.
HMV's vinyl offerings cater to a growing market sector but not sufficiently large to support the business.
I, for one, want to see a thriving high street; to achieve that we need the following for starters - reductions in business rates, effective taxation of retailers who are principally online, lower cost parking, better public transport in/around city centres - think manchester free bus.
Those few suggestions will not, in themselves, re-invigorate the high street but they could provide a starting point.

I wondered how long it would before ubiquitous mike piped up.

Well thanks, just enjoying a quiet day getting turned around after Christmas, hows your day going? Glad people are keeping an eye on my post count though.....

To add on the Ashley thing paying people properly would also impact his business greatly, he has done well from picking over the carcass of the high street. If it was succeeding he wouldn't be doing so well.

Store selling stuff people no longer want, again, struggling again.

Glad people are keeping an eye on my post count though…..

Not so much keeping an eye on it, it's just hard to miss...

Glad people are keeping an eye on my post count though…..

It's not really that hard tbh, you pop up on here more often than Ashley on the high street.... 🤣

Well there you go it is a forum, just get to spend plenty of time on public transport or waiting for things to finish, and the hashtag guys, best Christmas present so far really. Must go and find something else to comment on, don't want to disappoint.

You never disappoint, Mick. 😊

They were in prime, expensive high street locations selling stuff that nobody buys like that any more.

CD's and DVD's? They might as well have been selling VHS tapes. Its just not a sustainable business model. Hasn't been for years. If you hadn't the nouse to see that one coming, you shouldn't be in business

Oh the irony, just saw an advertisement for Spotify flash up.

Think the main problem for hmv is competing with Amazon, until online suppliers are taxed accordingly it will help the high street

Tax? Lot more issues than just that, public transport is shit, cycle access/storage issues, parking is scarce/costs, most provincial town centres are thoroughly depressing places.

The decent places locally are smaller towns that have small Indy shops, local provincial town is lying half empty, it's all owned by 2 guys, and they receive vacation allowances for the shops being empty, so don't give a ****.

If M&S goes, you'd be as well closing the town centre tbh.

Just been down the town centre to take back some kids stuff. It was rammed.

What would we actually lose if crappy town centres closed down? There will always be a demand for experience shops and boutique stuff. The rest of the space would be regenerated into parks, housing, offices.

Let's face it, we don't need all the crap we buy, no great loss if the opportunities to do so become more limited.

His Master's Voice is an odd sort of name for a shop. Just saying.

I'd far rather we kept our town centres, and lost all the god awful out of town retail parks. Truly horrendous places.

Think the main problem for hmv is competing with Amazon

I'd be surprised if Amazon still sells a lot of CDs and DVDs. I think it's the lack of a market that's the main problem, not that they are being undercut.

The problem in one handy chart

His Master’s Voice is an odd sort of name for a shop. Just saying

How long have you been waiting for an excuse to get that bit of knowledge squeezed into conversation 😂👍

Old people (they're not disappearing any time soon) still buy CDs.

*shrugs*

but they are selling a fraction of the amount they were, as above in the US about 10% of the peak volume. That level of sales drop doesn't bode well for a high street retailer even without the competition.

The UK needs to have an adult discussion concerning consumerism - do we want high streets, should high streets just become occupied by coffee shops, should people continue shopping with an online retailer who doesn't pay their fair share of the tax burden, can we look beyond buying the cheapest product and actually look at the big picture. That's a start.

If M&S goes, you’d be as well closing the town centre tbh.

We lost our M&S but we did gain another charity shop. I wonder what will fill the empty unit HMV will leave behind?

The demise of HMV is different from other stores. People are not buying cheaper CD's online over HMV ones. It is not an example of people buying like for like. Since downloadable music has arrived the possibilities of music you can purchase has increased logarithmically. I could make music in my bedroom and put it out on sites like bandcamp. I could never do that before. I can browse online and listen to music before buying. There is great stuff being produced but it can be found away from shops like HMV. I won t shed a tear at its loss.

How long have you been waiting for an excuse to get that bit of knowledge squeezed into conversation

Sadly Neal I suspect that I came out with exactly the same last time HMV went t'ward the plughole.

csb

What would we actually lose if crappy town centres closed down? There will always be a demand for experience shops and boutique stuff. The rest of the space would be regenerated into parks, housing, offices.

Basically this imo. There's nothing innately superior or worthy about bricks and mortar retail in many cases. We shouldn't mourn the failing of businesses that have become obsolete. We should plan for it, and help people it affects, but that's different.

We shouldn’t mourn the failing of businesses that have become obsolete.

+1

Far better that the capital and human resources be deployed on something actually profitable than keeping a failing business model running just because it used to be profitable.

I don’t have anything to play cds or dvds.

I have bought many films on google play, as recently as last week. I pay a subscription to apple music monthly.

A lot of people are like me, I am genuinely surprised HMV haven’t folded sooner.

The death of faceless high street dinosaurs is a brilliant thing for the highstreet, lets think back to when HMV was putting independent record stores out of business.

Hopefully in time the high street will be different in every town and city, with different independent shops each providing a unique shopping experience.

Hopefully the bookies will be next, can only be a matter of time for online betting to take over from these archaic dens of depression.

No but town centres are something that should exist, they give community and places to meet for more than just retail. If done properly.
Many businesses are well suited to bricks and mortar stores, HMV ain't one of them

I dunno, flicking through racks of cds and vinyls made it feel like I was getting some exercise, which I don't get from an algorithm that spews music into my auditory cortex. Finding that one title, incorrectly displayed in some farflung corner, had me walking farther in an afternoon than I currently walk in a month.

Totally agree with that MWS,it's not just all about us, a community such as pensioners, young families etc all benefit from a thriving town centre.

I still buy CDs. RIP to FLAC, store on NAS. Can't stand DRM downloads or getting MP3s that aren't CD quality. And that's considering CDs aren't perfect. Streaming has reduced quality to suit the mobile and crappy headphone generation.

But then I also grumble at the death of the album. Streaming has reduced music to pic'n'mix.

That said CDs come from Amazon. Can't remember last time I'd been in HMV. A few years ago maybe. I don't really go into town centres anyway.

Interesting though that Sainsbury's sell vinyl as I discovered recently (rarely go into big supermarkets either).

Streaming has reduced quality to suit the mobile and crappy headphone generation.

But then I also grumble at the death of the album. Streaming has reduced music to pic’n’mix.

It's different but for the majority of people they would not be able to pick the difference between CD and Stream at a good rate, Not many people have the kind of hifi set up to do that or listening environment, for most people music is something that you listen to not admire in a gallery sense.

still buy CDs. RIP to FLAC, store on NAS. Can’t stand DRM downloads or getting MP3s that aren’t CD quality.

Downloads are great if you are not after the latest offerings from Beyonce or U2. There is a plethora of great music out there that 99% of the population will never feel the inkling to explore. The 99% gave up on HMV because they could get The greatest hit of JLS cheaper on Spotify.

You have a very daily mailesque view of Spotify.

Our local High Street is just depressing. Saw various High Street photographs on the evening news, looked depressed and a copy of the one here.

HMV is directly opposite a closed and empty Topshop / Topman shop. Debenhams a little further down (what a depressing old fashioned business model is that !). A Poundland, a Pound Stretcher, 2 Costas, Cafe Nero, streets with lots of obese and scruffy types.

Parking at £2.50 per hour, or 20 mins free.

Just has no draw for me at all ! The High Street is just dying, and it just does not surprise me.

You have a very daily mailesque view of Spotify.

No I don't. I use Qobuz rather than Spotify but there is loads of good content on both.

What I do have is a daily mailesque view of people that use Spotify to buy the same pap they would previously sought out in HMV.

A holier than thou attitude to others music tastes by the sound of it.

It's just the way things are going.

I don't even have a an optical drive on my PC anymore, well I do but it's only still there as it matches the case which is all brushed aluminum and I've lost the blanking plate. I can't even use it as it's an IDE drive and motherboards don't have IDE interfaces any more.

I ditched all my CDs years ago after ripping them to digital storage.

A holier than thou attitude to others music tastes by the sound of it.

Not that either nobeer. I like music that is no more high brow than anyone else. I regularly buy downloads of artists that I had never heard of before doing a browse on bandcamp. I truly think peoples eyes need opened, none more so than those now feeling sad at the down turn of HMV and the nostalgia of the smell of the plastic of a CD case.

My local town belper has a buzzing high street, however it's biggest chain shop is probably wilkos or Iceland with the rest being independent type shops, with one new one I saw today which was ironically selling vinyl. Derby however has some really run down areas now with closed shops, the parking pruces in the intu shopping centre are also eyewateringly expensive and it pisses me off every time I'm forced to use them.

I still enjoyed seeing an HMV, walked into the tiny one in Stirling and (half jokingly) asked if they had any Kyuss. She walked me over to the Metal section (which I hadn't even seen) where they had three albums, happy days!

Given that everything is easy to find and instantly available online, I almost find relief in the totally arbitrary constraint of what is physically held in a store. Same with books to be honest. Still gives you a wee bit of childish excitement when you see that one album you've been meaning to buy for ages sitting on the shelf.

How will HMV's woes affect Fopp?

My wife noticed the other day that our new car doesn't have a cd player. Meh.

Tell her not to worry, lots of indie labels are putting out albums on cassette again.

These two articles show exactly why streaming music is really theft from the artists, and why the loss of high street stores like HMV is a critical loss to the music industry.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/dec/30/demand-for-creativity-on-the-cheap-is-destroying-music-industry-hmv
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2018/dec/30/hmv-is-a-bedrock-of-the-british-music-industry-its-loss-would-affect-us-all

This is where brands such as HMV come in – high-street retail representatives of an old-school music culture that was, in myriad ways, stupid, depressing, corrupt, bloated and ridiculous. But at least back then people realised that, when they wanted music, they first had to pay for it. Home taping or bootlegging were about as cheeky as it got. Now, that automatic consumer decency has gone – at some point, people convinced themselves that they didn’t have to pay as much (or at all) for certain modes of entertainment.

Whatever this attitude is (exciting and contemporary? Or cheapskate, depressing and tantamount to the industrial undermining of an art form? Discuss), it’s a genie that’s well and truly out of the music industry bottle, and HMV looks like becoming its latest victim. Certainly, it comes to something when the only things as bloated, ridiculous and corrupt as the music industry are the lazy, over-entitled consumers themselves.