Richer Sounds Ireland Closed?

Mr. Fancypants

Article in the Sunday Tribune says that the Irish franchise of Richer Sounds is to close temporarily as it owes €800,000.
Just looking at their website now and it doesnt seem to say anything about it...

byte

God I hope it doesn't close. That'd be a shame if it did. Have to wait and see, i guess..:eek:

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

Kali

Lyric Hi-Fi, the more higher-end arm of Richer Sounds closed their premises back in November afaik and haven't relocated since (although when I ring them up they say they're still in the process of moving).

Vexorg

The other week I noticed that the RicherSounds.ie website shows the belfast number as the contact number, and when I was up in Belfast a couple of weeks ago, the shop had the richersounds.ie address in big letters accross their front window.

May have nothing at all to do with the above.


Vex.

Borzoi

Not surprised if they did close, I started to hate that shop, despite having bought half a dozen bits o kit from them.

Why? Because their staff were, IMO, twats.

Last incidence was when they said that I couldn't get a Pioneer radio that could be controlled via the main amp remote, and tried to sell me €400 tuner instead. I went up to hifi corner who ordered in the Pioneer one for €130

Latest incident where a Sony multichanger I had my eye on was €20 more expensive in riecher than ina Sony shop. FFS.

Again recently to repair my CD changer, they wanted to charge €17, to give me an estimate on the repairs, and take up to 2 weeks. Rang the Pioneer agents, who said drop it in and we'll see what it costs, shouldn't take more than a week to fix.

So, really it's no surprise to me if they went belly-up, but then again they do have a habit of taking short (cheap) leaases, and moving every 6-9months to a nearby spot.

Bard

First I'd heard of Richer Sounds was years ago in an advert in Viz in which they claimed "Our sales staff have larger sexual organs than those in other hi-fi stores!"... 'Cheeky!', I thought, '...must check 'em out!'

I got a voucher for their store as a gift and used it against a Sony MemoryStick Walkman (MP3 player basically) which I ended up returning as it was faulty. The staff were friendly and accommodating...

If they're closing down, I hope they have a closing down sale ... need some stuff

Kali

Their website says the Dublin one is closed until further notice and the Cork branch is closed temporarily.

Bjorn

i ordered an amp there last week - and the guy said (in Belfast) that the Dublin Store was closed until April 7 (today) didnt say why though , would be a real shame if they closed ive bought a number of items from them, found them excellent

byte

Originally posted by Bard
First I'd heard of Richer Sounds was years ago in an advert in Viz in which they claimed "Our sales staff have larger sexual organs than those in other hi-fi stores!"

Yea, that's where I first heard of them too, though they were only in UK at the time, AFAIK (ah the great ol days of adult comics like Viz, Gas, Electric Soup, etc sadly not as funny anymore) :rolleyes:

johncorleone

It's an awful pity if they have closed down
There are now *NO* decent commercial hi-fi stockists in Dublin
Sure they made their mistakes from time to time but who doesn't, Ive always found them to be fairly good and at least they made specialist hi-fi kit available in this country. All I can say is that to be 800,000 Euro in debt someone must have been doing something *very* dodgy. The place was always packed when I was there and the markup on that kind of kit has to be pretty good.

A sad loss

John

daveg

Not surprised if they did close, I started to hate that shop, despite having bought half a dozen bits o kit from them.

Same here. Not that pushed if they do close. I tend to buy all my stuff over the web now.

viking

Yep, they have definitely closed down. Passed by their store today on the quays in Dublin and there is a notice on the window stating that Richer Sounds Ireland have closed and that any pending business or after sales enquiries should be directed to Belfast.

I have to agree with Borzoi, their prices recently were far from competitive. E.g. A Philips LX3000 was being sold in RS for €499, if you walked 30 seconds around the corner to Dame Street to the Philips store on the corner of Georges Street you can find it for €399!! I'm afraid the writing was most definitely on the wall...

Anyone know when RS dropped the "Cheapest in Town" slogan, last time I saw then use it was about 2-3 years ago?

viking

commited

Originally posted by johncorleone
It's an awful pity if they have closed down
There are now *NO* decent commercial hi-fi stockists in Dublin
Sure they made their mistakes from time to time but who doesn't, Ive always found them to be fairly good and at least they made specialist hi-fi kit available in this country. All I can say is that to be 800,000 Euro in debt someone must have been doing something *very* dodgy. The place was always packed when I was there and the markup on that kind of kit has to be pretty good.

A sad loss

John

TBH, I disagree with some of this..
THey werent the only decent commercial stockist, infact they were no where near the best..
Cloney Audio in Blackrock is definately the place to go, or HM entertainment..
Surprised that they lost that much.. doesnt sound quite right..
Maybe he was writing losses from the UK to Ireland, so he could get his World record for most amount of ££ generated per cubic metre!

Thumper Long

Good bye richer sounds and good riddance to rising prices, shams of staff (well the more recent ones anyway) who dont know their arse from there elbow and refurbished eastern european ****e. the last item i bought there looked like it had been used to chop logs on it was a refurbished sony vcr sold to me as new, full price too, what a cheek, so i hope the city sherrifs come and pull mr rs out of bet in the wee small hours of the morning and torture the fecker. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

dmeehan

i only ever bought blank mini dics from them
didnt fancy paying the "HMV tax"

Kali

Originally posted by commited
TBH, I disagree with some of this..
THey werent the only decent commercial stockist, infact they were no where near the best..
Cloney Audio in Blackrock is definately the place to go, or HM entertainment..

Cloney Audio are ridiculously over-priced on most gear, my cans are twice the retail price there, and most if not all its stock can be sourced cheaper on the web (including the associated huge delivery charges when you're talking about larger equipment), if you have the money to spare though, I don't doubt their expertise and the quality of the merchandise they stock at all.
For smaller stuff they're not too bad, quality interconnects & speaker cable (I bought by Van Der Hul connects there).

HM Entertainment aren't too bad, small range of gear though (and no decent cables) and again prices are bit high (tho not anyway as bad as Cloney), not bad for Marantz gear, I can't recall what speakers they stock off hand though.

Samson

Where are HM Entertainment?

Makaveli

Main street in Blackrock. Beside Supermacs I think.

the corpo

also a hm on dawson st

eth0_

Originally posted by Kali
Lyric Hi-Fi, the more higher-end arm of Richer Sounds closed their premises back in November afaik and haven't relocated since (although when I ring them up they say they're still in the process of moving).

I'm pretty sure Lyric were owned by Virgin ...even if they weren't, the premises they were in was Virgin megastores.

NIBBS

I think it's a real pity that they are gone, I agree that the staff and prices in recent times left a lot to be desired - all you had to do was check out their .co.uk website to see how much they'd added to the price of certain items over here.............but there aren't other discount hi-fi shops around here now are there ????

places like Clooney and Lyric are well and good, but they have generally high prices and high markups, they service the higher end of the market............there have been a few closures of smaller hi-fi stores in recent months, it's not a good sign, maybe someone else will take it over or come in fresh...

KdjaCL

Richer Sounds were the best HiFi shop Ireland ever had anyone who thinks the staff were twats must be a bit of a dumbass to go into a hifi specialist shop needing help, you go in knowing exactly what you need and shouldnt need assistance ,only to get it if its up high.

I always found them excellent tho never needed to ask them anything i usually researched the product i was buying well inadvance and always got it in RS cheaper than anywhere in Ireland.

kdjac

mike65

Always a pity when a choice goes bust, and there are
defintily fewer retailers around these days. Waterford though has two places - Sherwoods and Toner but I'm sure there were 4 about 15 years back.

Cork had a decent place the name of which I've forgotten with two outlets, the hifi stuff was in the centre, in Washington Street (?) Is it still in business?

Mike.

Altheus

So what happens now, does that mean my ****ing 3 year walk in repair and replace warranty is null and void, there was me thinking it was a bargain for €20.

Kali

They're not gone bankrupt, RS UK will still have to honour your guarantee, plus it isn't usually with any particular store, I'd say theres fine print covering themselves over delivery etc. but apart from that I wouldn't worry.

Borzoi

Originally posted by KdjaC
anyone who thinks the staff were twats must be a bit of a dumbass to go into a hifi specialist shop needing help,

LOL

What is the role of specialists, except to advise non-specialists?

In your case K, you know so much that the shop was irrelevant, you'd always get something off the interweb. For mere mortals like myself I found hifi corner and HM to be better and more helpful, and not full of staff who were twats.;)

Kali

Was in HM on dawson st. the other day, asked did they stock any high-quality analog interconnects, was greeted with a "what do you mean by interconnects?" and a puzzled look. After I explained he went "ahh twin phono cables" and showed me a bog-standard 20EUR cable (err no thanks mate I have enough of those)

Borzoi

Was in Maplins in Blanch on Saturday, good selection of interconnects and adaptor etc.

Got bits to connect the X-Box to the AV amp for top quality sound.:D

s8n

any ideas where you go with returns for richer sounds???

s8n

see post above this one