Good Guys Emeryville California 2006 - 3054352001

The Good Guys, Inc., was an American chain of

consumer electronics Consumer electronics, also known as home electronics, are electronic devices intended for everyday household use. Consumer electronics include those used for entertainment, Communication, communications, and recreation. Historically, these prod ...

retail stores The retail format (also known as the retail formula) influences the consumer's store choice and addresses the consumer's expectations. At its most basic level, a retail format is a simple marketplace, that is; a location where goods and services ar ...

with 71 stores in

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

Oregon Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...

, and

Washington Washington most commonly refers to: * George Washington (1732–1799), the first president of the United States * Washington (state), a state in the Pacific Northwest of the United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A ...

. The company was headquartered in

Brisbane, California Brisbane (pron. ) is a small city in San Mateo County, California, located on the lower slopes of the San Bruno Mountain. The city is on the northeastern edge of San Mateo County, located immediately south of the San Francisco city limits on t ...

, in the

Dakin Building The Dakin Building is an architectural award-winning class A office building on the San Francisco Bay in Brisbane, California. Serving as a corporate headquarters building for several companies of national prominence, it was built from the profi ...

in the early 1990s and subsequently in

Alameda, California Alameda ( ; ; Spanish for "Avenue (landscape), tree-lined path") is a city in Alameda County, California, United States, located in the East Bay (San Francisco Bay Area), East Bay region of the Bay Area. The city is built on an informal archipe ...

, until it was bought in late 2003 by Mexican businessman

Carlos Slim Carlos Slim Helú (; born 28 January 1940) is a Mexican business oligarch, investor, and philanthropist. From 2010 to 2013, Slim was ranked as the richest person in the world by ''Forbes'' business magazine. He derived his fortune from his e ...

, who also purchased

CompUSA CompUSA, Inc. was a retailer and reseller of Personal computer, personal computers, consumer electronics, technology products and computer services. Starting with one Brick and mortar, brick-and-mortar store in 1986 under the name Soft Warehouse, ...

OfficeMax OfficeMax is an American office supplies retailer founded in 1988. As an independent chain, it was the third-largest office supply retailer in the United States. Following a 2013 merger, it is currently a brand and subsidiary of Office Depot. ...

Barnes & Noble Barnes & Noble Booksellers is an American bookseller with the largest number of retail outlets in the United States. The company operates approximately 600 retail stores across the United States. Barnes & Noble operates mainly through its B ...

Office Depot The ODP Corporation is an American office supply retailer headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida. The company operates 922 retail stores in the United States under the Office Depot and OfficeMax brands, as well as e-commerce sites and a business ...

Borders A border is a geographical boundary. Border, borders, The Border or The Borders may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Film and television * ''Border'' (1997 film), an Indian Hindi-language war film * ''Border'' (2018 Swedish film), ...

, and

Circuit City Circuit City Corporation, Inc., formerly Circuit City Stores, Inc., is an American consumer electronics retail company, which was founded in 1949 by Samuel Wurtzel as the Wards Company, operated stores across the United States, and pioneered th ...

. The Good Guys was founded in 1973 by Ron Unkefer on Chestnut Street,

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

. By 2006, all of the company's stores had closed.

WOW! Stores

In 1995, The Good Guys teamed up with

Tower Records Tower Records is an international retail franchising, franchise and online music store that was formerly based in Sacramento, California, United States. From 1960 until 2006, Tower operated retail stores in the United States, which closed when ...

to create one "WOW!" Store in

Las Vegas, Nevada Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...

, featuring a mixture of Tower and Good Guys inventory and a coffee shop and included the world's largest promotional slot machine. Tower's founder

Russell Solomon Russell Malcolm Solomon () was an American entrepreneur and most notable as the founder of the worldwide retail music store empire, Tower Records. Personal life Early life Russell Solomon was born in Sacramento, California, and grew up the ...

reportedly liked the end result and two more WOW! Multimedia Superstores were opened, one in Long Beach, California, where

Neil Diamond Neil Leslie Diamond (born January 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. He has sold more than 130 million records worldwide, making him one of the List of best-selling music artists, best-selling musicians of all time. He has written and ...

played at the grand opening and others opened in

Laguna Hills Laguna Hills (; ''laguna'' being ) is a city in southern Orange County, California, United States. Its name refers to its proximity to Laguna Canyon and the much older Laguna Beach. Other newer cities nearby—Laguna Niguel and Laguna Woods— ...

and

San Mateo, California San Mateo ( ) is the most populous city in San Mateo County, California, United States, on the San Francisco Peninsula. It is part of the San Francisco Bay Area metropolitan region, and is located about south of San Francisco. San Mateo border ...

. By 2006, Tower was bankrupt and Good Guys was being consolidated into CompUSA, and thus all of these stores closed.

Re-launch

After all The Good Guys stores closed,

began marketing all

and

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

stores as "CompUSA with The Good Guys Inside" in response to

Best Buy Best Buy Co., Inc. is an American multinational consumer electronics retailer headquartered in Richfield, Minnesota. Originally founded by Richard M. Schulze and James Wheeler in 1966 as an audio specialty store called Sound of Music, it was r ...

's new marketing campaign "with Magnolia Inside". This marketing campaign was dropped in an attempt to further separate CompUSA from the Good Guys name, and assist in launching its new Home Entertainment sections in select locations. The Good Guys name once again ceased to exist in 2008 when CompUSA closed its remaining stores. Extended warranties on televisions purchased through The Good Guys or CompUSA can still be accessed through General Electric Extended Warranties.

Hostage crisis

In 1991, one of the stores in the chain located in Sacramento was taken over by four gunmen. This event became the largest hostage rescue operation on home soil in U.S. history to date, with about 50 hostages being held at gunpoint.

References

:*"Good Guys lose suit to block competition,"

The Sacramento Bee ''The Sacramento Bee'' is a daily newspaper published in Sacramento, California, in the United States. Since its foundation in 1857, ''The Bee'' has become the largest newspaper in Sacramento, the fifth largest newspaper in California, and the 2 ...

, December 2, 1987. :
Market Place; Electronics Chain On Roller Coaster
"

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

, July 6, 1992. :*"Good Guys bets that the customer is always right,"

San Jose Mercury News ''The Mercury News'' (formerly ''San Jose Mercury News'', often locally known as ''The Merc'') is a morning daily newspaper published in San Jose, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is published by the Bay Area News Group, a subsidia ...

, November 23, 1992. :*"Good Guys horror still vivid to ex-hostages 4 years later,"

, April 3, 1995. :
Good Guys CEO Discloses Master Plan
"

San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and M. H. de Young, Michael H. ...

, July 27, 1999. :*"Good Guys Inc. will drop computers, office products,"

Seattle Post-Intelligencer The ''Seattle Post-Intelligencer'' (popularly known as the ''Seattle P-I'', the ''Post-Intelligencer'', or simply the ''P-I'') is an online newspaper and former print newspaper based in Seattle, Washington (state), Washington, United States. Th ...

, August 2, 1999. :
Good Guys to spin off web store
" CNET, January 5, 2000. :
The Good Guys Laying Off 450 Employees
,

, March 2, 2001. :
CompUSA to purchase Good Guys: $58 million deal expected to benefit both companies
,

, September 30, 2003. :
Good Guys quarterly sales fall, sees wider loss
"

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine founded by B. C. Forbes in 1917. It has been owned by the Hong Kong–based investment group Integrated Whale Media Investments since 2014. Its chairman and editor-in-chief is Steve Forbes. The co ...

, June 10, 2003. :
Ex-Good Guys director settles SEC charges
"

MSNBC MSNBC is an American cable news channel owned by the NBCUniversal News Group division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. Launched on July 15, 1996, and headquartered at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan, the channel primarily broadcasts r ...

, April 26, 2005. :
Good Guys to close stores: Stand-alone outlets in California and Hawaii to get the ax
"

, October 6, 2005. :
Tower Records Welcome Video, 1999.
" Specific Marker mentions WOW! Stores and how it was formed, this info was used in the WOW! Section.

External links

The Good Guys, Inc. History
at FundingUniverse {{Authority control Defunct consumer electronics retailers of the United States Defunct retail companies of the United States Retail companies based in California Companies based in San Mateo County, California Brisbane, California Retail companies established in 1973 Retail companies disestablished in 2005 1973 establishments in California 2005 disestablishments in California Defunct companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area

WOW! Stores

Re-launch

Hostage crisis

See also

References

External links