The Story of RadioShack | The rise and fall of the tech giant | "The Story Of" S1E1

In this video I go into the rise and fall of the tech giant from the twenties, RadioShack. RadioShack had its early beginning as a technological radio boutique in Boston that ended up being purchased by a leather company from Fort Worth, Texas. Almost 100 years later however, the store would fall from grace.
-
Like, subscribe, and enjoy yourself!
-
-
-
Retro, radio, store, abandoned, bankrupt, RadioShack, old, company, commentary, storytime, computers, technology, phone, wireless, old, history, research, moon, mall, tonight, enjoy, late night

[@kevinfletcher7567]

Used to know the catalog numbers for all their resistors and capacitors. sue ran the store in Monroe, even ran a BBS! OH, those were the days.

[@woofgbruk5947]

I really miss looking around in Tandy/Radio shack here in UK, Loved getting the catalogues in the mail.

[@rodriguezfranco3839]

Make Radio Shack Great Again !!!

[@jordan390a]

Radio Shack's heyday was from ~ 1968 through 1992 or so...

[@JML1987]

Worked there for 5 years or so and when company training meetings focused only on cell phone sales and they selected brand new 18 yr old employees as "Wireless Consultants" as a new spin on things where we would all role-play in getting people to buy new phones, I new shit was going down. It was so cringey and dishonest I even got called out by the District Manager for me saying "nah I don't wanna be a 'Consultant'. I like being able to point people to whatever they need for anything and don't want to take away the majority of commission from the other employees." Not long after stores started closing and got a new job. Biggest waste of my life ever. There's still some nostalgia though.

[@jackilynpyzocha662]

I hung out at the Eastfield Mall in Springfield, MA, and purchased the 1000 RLX with the computer, keyboard, mouse, monitor and printer. I also had a three-year warranty, which was helpful, the hard drive (20 gig) jumped from DOS to Desk Mate, for no apparent reason. A new hard drive fixed the problem. I miss the system. I also learned a version of BASIC and DOS, but loved Desk Mate, an early Graphical User Interface(GUI). I learned a great deal and had fun, too. Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy and Hangman.

[@LarryRobinsonintothefog]

They left the TV on at work and Howie Long was one of the football commentators and I said, "Look there's the guy from the Radio Shack commercials."

[@arizonaalchemy7572]

Really Cool to find this, Very Well Done !! I worked for the SHACK from 1979 through 1988, they were Fun times. Witnessed alot of Innovations. Sad to see such an Iconic company die. The remains of the company were bought by a corporation in South America and they are making a come back down there.

[@glenfenderman]

Recently I found a Radio Shack graphic equalizer and a stereo mixing console at a thrift store. I grabbed them, and I'll grab anything that says Radio Shack or Realistic on it. Many years ago I used a friend of mine's Radio Shack electret mikes to do some recording on my guitar amp. They were phenominal !

[@getprobed838]

I had a Tandy 386 and then a 486 from Radio Shack.

[@jackilynpyzocha662]

A great book "Tandy's Money Machine: How Charles Tandy Built Radio Shack... Into the World's Largest Electronics Chain" 1992 is a great book by Irvin Farman, history.

[@jackilynpyzocha662]

I miss the mall stores! It is online now.

[@franciscolopez3229]

I still got a kinda good condition 1980 Radio Shack catalog. I wonder where are all the unsold C.B. Base antennas are? Sure would love one those .64's.

[@vicheakeng4884]

Something to 1992 Integra for now unless 4:12

[@KILLAKAYONE]

How could this doc completly skip over CB radio? it was THE store for the CB craze

[@JSchaye]

Salis lost a huge amount of they were not investors. They were lenders

[@JK-fv9xk]

I like your NY street voice

[@w5hro]

Why hasn't anyone who has put together these videos about Radio Shack ever covered the merger with Allied Radio? In 1970 the Tandy Corporation took over Allied Radio and merged it together with Radio Shack. Radio Shack became Allied Radio Shack until the government stepped in and made them break it up by 1973. I remember going to the Allied Radio Shack store in Fort Wayne Indiana after the merger. They made the Allied Store there an Allied Radio Shack store. It's seems to be a really important part of the story which these videos always leave out.

[@LarryRobinsonintothefog]

Used to have an Allied Radio Shack electronics dictionary and occasionally bought components at Allied, but mostly at Radio Shack.

[@peacearchwa5103]

Tandy should have known that the Nixon Administration would ultimately rule that Tandy's takeover of Allied Radio was an anti-competitive merger, reducing marketplace competition and therefore presumably harming consumers. Shame on Tandy for thinking they could get away with the stunt, though had it occurred in more recent decades and with Tandy having better lobbyists in DC they might have succeeded with this merger today.

[@ZTenski]

They should have stuck with selling components.

[@JSchaye]

Wow did you get this story wrong. First you didn’t discuss Radio Shake in Boston. My Dads best friend was the CEO Lewis Kornfeld. Then the issue with the lender on the assets based lender was their demise.

[@LarryRobinsonintothefog]

Seen Lewis Kornfeld in his plaid jacket but never spoke to him.

[@peacearchwa5103]

The early history of Radio Shack is poorly presented. The 1980s commercials running in the background had nothing to do with the original mail-order-based Radio Shack of Boston. The producer here could have used images and advertisements from old radio publications for the Radio Shack company. I don't know the exact chronology of Lewis Kornfeld's career with Radio Shack but he was an exceptionally fine marketer and executive. The occasional "Flyer-Side Chat" commentaries in the periodic RS sale catalogs were fun reading. Kornfeld retired as CEO in 1981, in that day and age Corporate America held by the rule that even senior execs had to retire when they reached 65 though they could stay on the board for a while longer.