On Mon, 16 Dec 2019 at 00:01, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
I blame me, and people like me. We stopped giving them enough business.
Don't beat yourself up over this. The Internet also sped the decline.
I do suspect, also, that the electronics industry has faded away from the T.O. area. Less industry creates less surplus. Last time I was at Active Surplus, quite a few years ago, I found some transistors at 10 for $1.00. The same parts at Home Hardware at College and Spadina were $.10 each. Active surplus just didn't have the "surplus" advantage any more.
These businesses thrived on the oddball, low-volume, specialty stuff that benefits from central warehousing. Stuff that used to be the realm of specialty stores like Raspberry Pis are now on Amazon and a bunch of other online retailers, along with the various patchboards and DIY stuff. People post shopping lists for kits that you can then just assemble in an online shopping cart, and shipping cost is often lower than round-trip bus fare.
I think the store I miss the most of this genre was Efston Science on Dufferin --- Post to this mailing list talk@gtalug.org Unsubscribe from this mailing list https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk