Chandleries

[Guest]

A bonus of working in Central London used to be the multiplicity of well-stocked chandleries scattered around the city. Then, some years ago visitors to St Kats lost the convenient Pumpkin just up the road. Telesonic in Bloomsbury followed a year or so later (but transferred its electronics sales to Capt O M Watts). A few weeks ago I was disappointed to discover that both London Yacht Centre near Liverpool Street Station and Kelvin Hughes in the Minories had recently shut their doors.

Today, shock horror, in pursuit of a last-minute Christmas present I found that Force 4 near Victoria closed down a couple of weeks ago, and Capt O M Watts in Piccadilly shuts on Saturday - and was now in the final throws of a Closing Down Sale! I dashed up there to find the place humming with people rummaging through the remnants, almost everything going for 50% off the previously discounted prices... Got some real bargains. Well, that's the last 'proper' chandlery gone from London. 'Tis a sad day.... (I discount "Ocean", the trendy water-skiing place by Embankment tube, and that ghastly Nauticalia 'clone' near the top of Shaftesbury Avenue, from being members of the genre).

Sadly MarineForce did not prove to be the saviour of Cruisermart after all, going down the pan after what, less than 12 months? So what went wrong? Is is just an Economy Thing? Are we not buying as much gear? Were the prices too cheap? (okay I'm joking). Or is everyone now buying through the web? Or their local marina shop? MarineForce must have wasted huge amounts of money on catalogues that were a shadow of the previous version, but the rot probably began when Cruisermart first bought up the independents but failed to rationalise. I gather that chandleries down on the south coast and the west country are now having a bit of a renaissance. Perhaps that's because they've got their hands on vast quantities of bankrupt stock!

What do other people think about the state of the nation's chandleries (whether or not you work in London)?

Merry Christmas everyone!

Nigel
Deep Thought

Medway Motor Yacht Club
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.mmyc.co.uk>http://www.mmyc.co.uk</A>

 

[byron]

First off... Pumpkins, I know the owner. They never went broke, he owns the freehold and could make more dosh without the hassle of running a business by renting out the building.
As regards the rest. It's a simple question of economics. The amount of stock a Chandler has to carry (investment) against the amount of sales you are going to make (profit) just don't add up. I could never understand anyone even trying to make a go of it unless Chandlery is run supported by other facets of the boating sphere.
As a company we point blank refuse to deal with any firm in leisure boating (believe me we are approached regularly) Over the past ¼ century I have seen too many come and go. Who out there recall Ladyline and others?

http://www.alexander-advertising.co.uk

 

[DepSol]

Byrons right you must be mad to buy up every kind of this and every kind of that when you are only likely to ever sell about half of it.

The chandleries that do well over here either have another service to provide or sell clothes.

It looks like the smaller chandleries will survive longer than the big catelogue people. I think it would be better if the bigger catelogue people actually did payment by instalments like Kays. then at least when things were bad they could turn around and say well we have this amount of money coming in every month. It will also encourage people to buy more by spreading the payments.

Dom

Ok so he's not santas Elf but he is an Elf !!

 

[BarryH]

I remember Ladyline, even at my tender age. They used to do their own range of VHF,s and the like. Thats going back a few years, so you must be older than your letting on!/forums/images/icons/wink.gif