Post by Fatal Rewind on Jul 28, 2023 0:51:07 GMT -5
Incredible Universe, the quick-lived electronics superstore, really lived up to its name, as it was a gigantic store. The one I went to in Houston seemed to be the length of a freaking football field (according to Wikipedia they were like 185,000 square feet in size). From what I could find, they (briefly) existed in Texas, California, Arizona, Virginia, Utah, Washington, Colorado, Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, Indiana and Georgia.
You got these i. d.s that were like the small ones from Kroger grocery stores that fit on your keychain; once you entered an I. Universe, a guy would scan them as you came in. I guess these were for potential discounts or something depending on how much you spent or whatever. Whenever I went there there was always a line of like a dozen people going in.
They stocked around 85,000 items, just tons and tons of goods everywhere. There was a stage even for sales demonstrations, possibly even a band but I never saw either at the store I visited. There was a home theatre room playing Star Trek: First Contact. I swear, every SINGLE time I came into that room when I visited was when they had the battle against the Duras Sisters. Always cool to see that Bird of Prey getting blown up on a decent-sized tv. At one point I heard the explosion travel all the way across the room, with it ending out right next to me, which I didn’t even notice I was standing by several speakers that were spread out across the room. I could've knocked one or more of those over!
I wondered if some people came there just to play video games. Doom 2 was always being played. I tried it a bit myself but didn't really know what I was doing (I would get Doom/my Sega 32X add-on later for my Genesis and understand it more then). Guys would be doing the deathmatches on there. There was also an early virtual reality system there but you had to pay $5 to play it. At first I shied away from it with how goofy people looked with the headgear on but then decided I didn't care what people thought, I wouldn’t be able to see them anyway. But then after deciding on that the vr display would be out of order the next time I went there. Oh well.
I've always been a console rather than a pc gamer so I was there for the waning days of the Sega CD. They were only like $20 each and with the first two I bought I. Universe mailed me a coupon for $10 off. I used those twice, thinking how nuts it was to get that much off when I spent so little. But then that only happened twice before that ended
Plus I realized later they were just getting in new customers anyway.
I. Universe ended up not even lasting three years. I knew of this lady who heard each store needed to clear $42 million a YEAR to make a profit. That's an absurd amount from back then and especially today (and pretty near-impossible today with Amazon and other online entities killing physical stores). But then, this was just the Tandy Corporation trying to stay relevant in the computer industry. It didn't work. (Decades later this made me think up a nickname for them, being "Incredibly Perverse" )
And even once they closed down the store spaces sometimes became difficult to sell! They were so massive nothing could be done with several of them for a while. At least the one I went to was made into a college campus. Made sense: you have a huge area to deal with, so put up a few walls to make them into classrooms, other spaces will be for administrative, financial aid, etc.
I remember there being a huge banner at the exits that read "HOPE YOU ENJOYED THE SHOW". Indeed, it was an enjoyable, albeit very expensive production that got cancelled early.
You got these i. d.s that were like the small ones from Kroger grocery stores that fit on your keychain; once you entered an I. Universe, a guy would scan them as you came in. I guess these were for potential discounts or something depending on how much you spent or whatever. Whenever I went there there was always a line of like a dozen people going in.
They stocked around 85,000 items, just tons and tons of goods everywhere. There was a stage even for sales demonstrations, possibly even a band but I never saw either at the store I visited. There was a home theatre room playing Star Trek: First Contact. I swear, every SINGLE time I came into that room when I visited was when they had the battle against the Duras Sisters. Always cool to see that Bird of Prey getting blown up on a decent-sized tv. At one point I heard the explosion travel all the way across the room, with it ending out right next to me, which I didn’t even notice I was standing by several speakers that were spread out across the room. I could've knocked one or more of those over!
I wondered if some people came there just to play video games. Doom 2 was always being played. I tried it a bit myself but didn't really know what I was doing (I would get Doom/my Sega 32X add-on later for my Genesis and understand it more then). Guys would be doing the deathmatches on there. There was also an early virtual reality system there but you had to pay $5 to play it. At first I shied away from it with how goofy people looked with the headgear on but then decided I didn't care what people thought, I wouldn’t be able to see them anyway. But then after deciding on that the vr display would be out of order the next time I went there. Oh well.
I've always been a console rather than a pc gamer so I was there for the waning days of the Sega CD. They were only like $20 each and with the first two I bought I. Universe mailed me a coupon for $10 off. I used those twice, thinking how nuts it was to get that much off when I spent so little. But then that only happened twice before that ended
Plus I realized later they were just getting in new customers anyway. I. Universe ended up not even lasting three years. I knew of this lady who heard each store needed to clear $42 million a YEAR to make a profit. That's an absurd amount from back then and especially today (and pretty near-impossible today with Amazon and other online entities killing physical stores). But then, this was just the Tandy Corporation trying to stay relevant in the computer industry. It didn't work. (Decades later this made me think up a nickname for them, being "Incredibly Perverse"
)And even once they closed down the store spaces sometimes became difficult to sell! They were so massive nothing could be done with several of them for a while. At least the one I went to was made into a college campus. Made sense: you have a huge area to deal with, so put up a few walls to make them into classrooms, other spaces will be for administrative, financial aid, etc.
I remember there being a huge banner at the exits that read "HOPE YOU ENJOYED THE SHOW". Indeed, it was an enjoyable, albeit very expensive production that got cancelled early.
