I'd be surprised. I used to live in Edinburgh and there's a lot of disposable income around there. The Scottish government is based there, financial capital of Scotland etc etc. Maybe some of the smaller units may close, but I doubt Edinburgh and Glasgow, surely?

Why would B&O need a store in, say, the small town of Yarm (no-one ever is ever in the store!), yet not in the capital city of Scotland?

B&O will not beat any hasty retreats from any part of the UK !!  If a store closes, it's because it's not viable and cannot now or would not be able to in future survive the economic downturn.  If B&O of The Outer Hebrides could turn over £2m a year, i doubt B&O would care very much where the Outer Hebrides were!!

I don't think it's a Scottish thing, and as moxxey rightly points out, there's plenty of money up there if you look around..

Lee

moxxey:

I'd be surprised. I used to live in Edinburgh and there's a lot of disposable income around there. The Scottish government is based there, financial capital of Scotland etc etc. Maybe some of the smaller units may close, but I doubt Edinburgh and Glasgow, surely?

Why would B&O need a store in, say, the small town of Yarm (no-one ever is ever in the store!), yet not in the capital city of Scotland?

But the same franchise was also in Durham - (a really expensive place to live) - they shut the Durham shop!

Frankly I would be surprised if Scotland were to become B&O'less.

There is still plenty of money "up north" and by that I mean real up north not yorkshire which we all know is "down South".

The store in Aberdeen, for example, has lots of oil exec's to service and will do so for the next 20-30 years and the exec's get paid no matter what the price of oil.

 The Durham store closing was because, I believe, the dealership was trying to push their higher spending customers towards the new flagship store in Newcastle. They looked at selling only pre-owned, a la Lifestyle AV, from the Durham store but I believe that was frowned upon from B&O uk.

We went down to perth today to shop (slightly more cosmoploiton than inverness......slightly!) and the store was closed :-(, am currently emailing from my laptop in a coffee shop (THAT is how up to date and techie Beoworld is, news to your doorstep faster than Sly News)  much to my disappointment and the window had no stock at all in it, so either a long holiday or Perth is one of the ones going, or gone.

BS

I did think Stirling looked a bit empty last week. Possibly both Stirling & Perth have closed, I do hope not. Common ownership afaik. 

If these dealers have closed, what happens to customer care/support for their existing client base? Do B&O UK take care of this or is it left to other dealers? 

the boss of my branch in west london is leaving , things MUST be bad

 :( 

but that was the Knightsbridge flagship store that the last ceo opened

then again , he prob contributed a lot to bno's current state 

ed7:

i think dealer has given -up  i asked for prices was some give away bs3000 (small clamper) £300,beolab speaker ex-display  for less than pre-owned  prices,shame i think he took over b&o dealership from wm cupar in 2005!! 

which store was that? 

I can't believe this - I was speaking to Andy from Stirling just a few weeks back, and heard no hint of the store closing....

If this is true I'd like to wish the teams at both stores the best of luck with their next positions, whatever they may be. 

I suppose if you are a franchise and things are not going well you have no option but to call it a day. I suppose if the store was a wholly owned B&O store things might be different. I wonder whether this is a weakness of the franchise model?

From what I am aware, the Edinburgh dealership isn't in a good state at the moment anyway.  I purchased from there just over a year back but the attitude of the sales guy seems to be very greedy.  I expect his boss has him on a target that he is struggling to meet.

I heard that the guys from the north of England are doing some of the business in Scotland that the Edinburgh shop is driving away.

Or southmolton street- there is no shortage of money in Mayfai!

Please let this not be so.  The only  way my other half will visit our birth place next year, is if he can visit the B&O stores in Edinburgh and Glasgow.

It seems to me that the franchise model with stores dedicated to B&O will lead to closures in harder times.   Inevitably the ones closing will be those serving the smaller markets.

In the last economic downturn, a number of independent retailers were still selling B&O alongside other product ranges.  Often these stores had experienced sales staff who had worked with B&O for years and could provide a ranges of services - not just sales.  As a result many in the 'lesser' locations survived only to be converted into full blown franchise type stores in recent times and struggle this time around.

If B&O was my business, I'd be keen to maintain a wide customer base and not lose the small sales.  I'd be keen to keep as many people as possible buying my product, even if was just a pair of headphones or a replacement stylus for a old turntable.  So I wonder if B&O is missing a trick here.

I believe they should allow/encourage these independents back, perhaps with some marketing support to create an instore B&O boutique  selling a limited range of products (possibly like Apple who have got stands in PCWorld these days running alongside their dedicated network).  Besides normal sales the independent stores could offer repairs, servicing and installation (which the newer franchises struggle with), and in return could channel 'high end' leads to the larger stores.