Silica Shop

[PanzerGeneral]

How about a feature on Silica Shop, anyone of a certain age will remember their adverts in the Computer press years ago. I used to love them as they sold shed loads of Atari, Intellivision, Coleco and Vectrex stuff. I came across some of their ads in my old mags the other day - they were selling off atari 800's for £69! and buy one get one free on Activision 2600 cartridges.

[Timothy Lumsden]

in theory this sounds great - but can't see what angle an article could come at it from...

[Greyfox]

yes I have to agree..with that..unless it was an article regarding all the selling outlets, not just Silca Shop, but I reckon tracking these people down would be near impossible to begin with, maybe RG should run a gallery or two..like they did in the live Publishing days...but I agree with Mr.Lumsden , I can't see how this could be turned into an article as such

[PanzerGeneral]

It could be based on the recollections of readers who remembered and dealt with Silica, another angle could be that Silica always seemed sell and support systems that no one else would touch - I seem to recall them selling the Aquarius, Coleco Adam and if I am not mistaken I think they also dealt with the Spectravideo SV 318/328, they also supported Atari like no-one else in the U.K - from a purely commercial outlook it looked like a mental business model - but they survived for years, how did they manage it given that they never took the easy route that all the multiple and some so called specialist retailers took?

[Kilb]

Ahh the Good Olde Days of Silica.
I purchased my Atari 520STFM from them, working like a dog doing 2 paper rounds a week to pay off the kingly price.
1987, what a year!

[merman]

Hmm, there might be a feature in the mail order/fan clubs side, but not necessarily in a shop/retail chain...

[Timothy Lumsden]

Hmm, there might be a feature in the mail order/fan clubs side, but not necessarily in a shop/retail chain...

any club like club Nintento which sent out exclusive stuff - presumably games? - might be interesting.

Covermounted cassettes might be a fun topic too - seeing what you got for free - sometimes great/sometimes shoddy as I remember.

[Lentini2001]

Got a picture here!

[bsg]

I've got quite a few early mags that I can scan Silica ads from as well, mostly related to ST and Amiga - unfortunately, the ads _I_ want, are the small pink A5 Sized booklets for the Atari 8 bit collection - they were, being brutally hones, the only place that saw the potention the 800XL had!

[yakmag]

Got a picture here!

That is the very Amiga setup I purchased!!!

From Silica Shop!!

(remembers fondly)...

[Meurglys68]

I recall going for a job interview at the Sidcup branch (1985ish). Didn't get the job though, obviously my knowledge of Atari was not up to scratch what with me being a Speccy owner.

[Fred83]

Escom,the company that bought amiga rights after commodore went bust took over some shops,interesting article here about it

http://www.amigahistory.co.uk/escomhist.html

[RMLF]

Again this is from memory so excuse us if its donkey balls, but was as told by an ex manager

Silica's expansion into Debenham's was necessary for it's growth as a company, but it expanded at completely the wrong time. In the recession,or towards the end of and there was not the financial liquidity for it to survive. Basically expanded too fast and fell flat on its arse when it couldnt get the finance to keep it going. Shame

Probably get more from the facebook group here

[filecore]

Silica's expansion into Debenham's was necessary for it's growth as a company, but it expanded at completely the wrong time. In the recession,or towards the end of and there was not the financial liquidity for it to survive. Basically expanded too fast and fell flat on its arse when it couldnt get the finance to keep it going. Shame

Yeh that's more or less right. I worked for Silica at the end in the Chester branch and when they closed that one they transferred me to Liverpool. (They were ex Escom stores). The only games stuff we sold then were Jaguars and PlayStations. Still, had a great time working there.

[oldtimer]

i used to spend all my saturday mornings in the Radio shack shop, playing with the trs80s if i remember right.(tandys)
Great days.
But funny, i dont remember silica shops....... Maybe there were none near me, or it was too early for them.