New York — The loss of one-fifth of Circuit City’s store base and all of Tweeter’s 94 locations begs the question of just where all of that market share will go.
According to Piper Jaffray analyst Mitchell Kaiser Sr., Best Buy could conceivably pick up as much as 30 percent of the approximately $2 billion that will be up for grabs, the Associated Press reported.
Looking at Circuit City alone, Credit Suisse analyst Gary Balter believes Best Buy will capture “well above” its 21 percent market share from the 155 liquidating stores, aided by the chains’ close proximity within the affected markets, he wrote in a research note.
But Jay Vandenbree, Sony SEL sales president, is less concerned about where the sales will go than the fact that they’ll find a home somewhere.
“If consumers can’t find something at a Circuit City, they will go somewhere else to buy it, or if they can’t find it at Wal-Mart, they go somewhere else to buy it,” he told TWICE. “I don’t know any consumers who go to one retail store and postpone their plans to purchase a product if they can’t find it there.
“The question becomes do they shop at Sears? Do they go online? Or do they go to a smaller independent retailer for their shopping experience? It will be interesting to see which value equation they do choose. But they are going to choose to buy nevertheless. I have that much faith in consumers that they will continue to do that,” Vandenbree said.
