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John Laposky

Circuit City Gets Mad
August 6, 2008

The New York Sun reported that an angry Circuit City exec sent a memo to stores ordering store employees to remove the August issue of Mad Magazine from its shelves after the venerable humor publication ran a parody of the chain’s ad circular, for a chain called Sucker City. They then reversed course and apologized when the original memo went public.

As I learned in Intro to Marketing, “All publicity is good publicity.” I guess Circuit realized that too, because when I clicked on the Sun story, I got a Circuit City pop-up ad and the story was posted under a Circuit City banner ad.

Posted by John Laposky on August 6, 2008 | Comments (13)

August 7, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Industry Veteran commented:

I have to admit "Sucker City" is a far worse name than the usual industry insider name of "Circus City" (especially at this delicate time). Ouch!

August 7, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Paoli Pete commented:

What is Circuit City doing selling Mad magazine anyway? They should stick to TVs. What a circus...............

August 7, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Morey Gottesman commented:

I agree with Pete - leave the magazines for the convenience stores. That's part of the reason CC is on their a**.

August 7, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
John Laposky commented:

To be fair, only about 40 of Circuit City's 700 American stores sell magazines. As Mad's editor-in-chief John Ficarra, said in a statement: "

August 7, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
John Laposky commented:

Let's try again: To be fair, only about 40 of Circuit City's 700 American stores sell magazines. As Mad's editor-in-chief John Ficarra, said in a statement: "We at MAD were shocked and confused by this entire incident — mainly because we had no idea Circuit City even sells magazines."

August 7, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Bill Penn commented:

Circuit City has blown a circuit. Who cares anyway? I didn't know they sold TVs...or anything else.

August 7, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
fmfeiler commented:

Circuit City needs all the help it can get to make fun of this store as Mad Magazine "

August 8, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Jason Osborn commented:

I think the reason Circuit got angry at this parody is that behind some of those jokes were grains of truth. Kudos to Mad Magazine for one of the funniest things I've seen in years!

August 8, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Phi Sig commented:

Go Rambo!

August 8, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Phi Sig commented:

Go Rambo!

August 8, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Marty commented:

Circuit City is clueless and the knee jerk reaction is indicative of the leadership at the corporate office. Lackey leadership has got them into the poorhouse and the talent has long left the building.

August 9, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Gary commented:

John's on target about publicity -- since the "MAD" story was already out there, CC made it work for them; twice, in fact. I suspect both traffic and sales went up as a result.

August 14, 2008
In response to: Circuit City Gets Mad
Bob from Canada commented:

Not only has the senior management team at CC destroyed a top company in the USA, they have killed the once mighty Radioshack business that took over 30 years to build in Canada.... What were they thinking when on more than one occasion they let go all of their top sales people in the USA and took all the benefits away from their Canadian sales reps....