TSC closes down

Guess it's a sign of the times the Hereford TX TSC store opened end of 2007 and done closed down first of this new year. Wonder how many more new stores they are going to shut down next and how many other businesses are going out? My problem with that store was the ignorant sales people could never get what I needed and their other stores west or east another 60 miles could.

Closed down??? There's a TCS that was just built near me in Olean, NY, that hasn't even opened yet!!!

Just passed it last night, they've got the sign up and lights on, should be opening in the next month or so.

Where near Olean is it?

Herman
I have to agree with you, I bought a dog kennel at the Hereford store and they wanted me to come back because they had no one to help me load it. If I hadn't paid for it and needed it right then i would has told them to forget it. I will say this I haven't been back. I think I will stick with Gebo's, much better service.
Gary

They built one here in Charleston and was suppose to open in December and now it's just sitting there with the lights on and no merchandise. Really hope they open, I have heard that they have the stuff we need out here.
Ron

Hope you have a horse or need some clothes otherwise the ones around here are a waste of good ground. They used to be an economical place to buy farm supplies; sprayer, mower, and TRACTOR parts and SUPPLIES, now an urban/yuppie/wannabe worthless POS.

While I haven't seen anything about TSC, a considerable number of chains are retrenching: closing stores they consider marginal producers, cancelling openings, and trying to sell locations partially or completely ready for occupancy.
Remember, with the lead time between deciding to expand and actual opening, these expansion plans were laid when times were going well, and many chains thought the slowdown would be temporary and quickly over. Probably the only new openings will be in areas they think will be quickly profitable.

The horsey people & townies will miss TSC.Real farmers will not.

Couldn't figure why they call it Tractor Supply when they're not tractor oriented?

We have Fleet Farm stores in Midwest & they're pretty good.

TSC is the only thing we have here. Beside feed mills, building suppliers,brand name equipment dealerships and the occasional "hole in the wall" jobber shop.

Our TSC isn't very good either. Like others say, too many urban homeowner products. We have a "Family Hearth and Home," which is a little better. Similar to TSC but more reasonable. All their bolts sell by the pound, except the specialty one. Have a fair supply of feeds.

We used to have a Farm and Fleet, but it closed.

Larry in Michigan

On Constitution Ave., the "back way" to Wal-Mart and Home Depot...

I agree with what others have written here; it's not really about tractor parts; it's more for horse owners, etc. But it's better than nothing, and nothing is what we had around here!

One of ther posts here wondered why TSC was called tractor supply. The answer is very simple. In 1938 the first store was opened in Minot.N D and it was a tractor supply company. You could get anything from short blocks to overhaul kits. And they were the cheapest place around. The one here still sells farm products and some parts. But mostly clothes and horse stuff and not the cheapest on most things.

Don't remember where I saw it but it seems like I read a prediction of 20% of existing stores may close. All stores, not TSC. There are just too many stores if people have to live within their means.

A lot of cities are going to lose at least one mall, they were overbuilt even before the recession. One of Cincinnati's malls was at 40% occupancy before, no reason to go there except for Bass Pro Shop.

I rather suspect that the stores frequented by Tractor Talk readers will get by pretty good, because I get the feeling that there are very few recreational shoppers on here. The stores that sell what you need should do fine, the others could be in trouble.

I went into TJ Max one time, they had seconds Levis for sale for more than the local farm store had firsts for. I never went back. I won't miss them if they shut down. That's true of 9 out of 10 stores at the mall.

I miss the old Sears catalogs.

Darn,I thought you meant ALL of'em. Place is useless! I'd be better off without it entirely. I wouldn't get my hopes up and waste time and miles going there just to have to come back and go three times as far in the other direction to s REAL store that has what I need.

yeah well the one around here is all towards the horsey people. yeah you can but 3pt equipment but it is made way light. they never have what i need on hand such as rake teeth or haybine gaurds and such. i find they are about good for buying drawbar pins and cleveses because they have a ton of those on hand. the only way they stay in buisness is that there are a lot of horse people around me. most of my neighbors agree with me. i"d rather spend the time and money at fleet farm!
DF in WI

to RBnSC--They got everything you need, tells
me that you are a "horse person"

Googling around a bit and reading between the business lines, looks to me like they're expecting the retail real estate market to crash so if they can't get the price they want now for rent, they're just closing and waiting for rents to come down.

The guys don't know squat about tractors or dog food, but they're pretty savvy and finances and marketing.

Nope,no interest a tall in horses. But around here it's easier to get stuff over the internet for or tractors or drive 60 miles to a real parts place and they order it and have it drop shipped.
Ron

Went to our local (Worthington MN) TSC to buy a hand saw for a project. Not one hand saw in the store. Have not been back since.

Merle

Did'nt TSC move into most of the old Central Tractor sites (Wellsville, Allegany, and Jamestown among others). The ones closest by have poor inventory and prices similar to farm equipment name brand dealers.
TSC is just like CT before their down turn and demise. In a big rip and expand, sacrifice depth and variety. The CT's made more money being fine tuned to their customer base. Sometimes an organization would be better to accept some good profit and not worrying about being a "Sprawl Mart" wannabe.

My experience with TSC is if it's not horse related it's out of stock..

They ain't perfect for sure but do have many items not carried in most stores these days plus they're open late and 7 days a week.TSC has gone up on some things lately but so has everyone else.

I read a lot of TSC bashing posts on here, and it makes me wonder what people expect. First, I will say I was a store manager 20 some years ago, before I left to farm more. Anyone who has never had to hire retail sales clerks for a store like TSC knows nothing about how few people know ANYTHING about agriculture (and mechanics or electrical, etc.)at all. The few people that do are farming and do not need a full-time job. They can sometimes be hired for part-time, but the needs of their farm limit their availability. Sure, maybe better help could be hired by paying more, but everyone expects their local store to be the cheapest on every item in the store. The age-old retail saying is "the fastest way out of business is to have the lowest price on everything". Basically, every store has products they identify as being important to their image that the item is sold cheaply. Customers will drive 25 miles one way to save $2, and will go to 5 different stores to buy 5 different items so they can get the cheapest price on each one. Customers (and a lot of those on here are exceptions, but you guys are a small minority) will sacrifice quality, service, convienience, and their first born son for a 5% discount. The other thing that amazed me was what we were expected to carry. I don't know how often I had the riot act read to me by a customer for not having the part he needed for, say, his Deere tractor. When I suggested he try the Deere dealer, the customer had already been to the dealer and was told the part needed to be ordered. WE could order it as well, but we were supposed to have every Deere part in stock, along with every Farmall, Case, AC, Oliver, MM, Ford, Cockshutt ever made. For example, take a starter for a popular tractor, say a Farmall M. If you sold one every year, that was great. One sold every two years was more like it. And yet, if you figured out that making $10 bucks every two years on a foot of shelf space was losing money and discontinued carrying the starter, when someone came in for the starter and you didn't have it, they would scream "everyone has an M, and they always need starters, how could you not stock a common item like that". Suggest they try the dealer, and listem to them B@@@H about the price at the dealer, or the dealer had to order it. It was always a no-win situation. Think about how many makes, models, and variations there are and the number of parts it takes to service them. Now multiply that by the fact that tractors now span a history of 80 years or so. Even the factory dealers have little in stock-but they each have their own territory and know what has sold there in the past, so they concentrate on servicing those products-even so, it suprises me to this day how many parts they don't stock. Sorry for the rant---thanks.

The whole chain deserves a slow painful death just like payless cashways. They specialize in stocking one of each item (just like payless used to do) and the guy who just left bought the one you went there to get. In other words, they specialize in being out of stock.
I hope they close them all. I have gone there for the last time and left empty handed.
James

Don't have a local TSC but, we have an Orscheln's. Almost the same. The local store goes out of their way to get what people need, even "real" farmers.

They opened a TSC in Alexandria, LA in September. Opening one in Natchitoches, LA in May.

Charles

TSC opened a store in oct of 07 about 35 miles from me.Our daughter lives near the store so I go the often.You cant expect a store to stock a lot of slow moving items.They have tires and batteries for tractors and a fair amount of parts for older tractors.There are plenty of tools and welding equipment.I was able to buy studded T steel fence posts for less that 1/2 the usual price.I still use cedar posts but their are places where T posts are needed.An area farm store was getting 19.50 for a 50 lb of 10-10-10 while TSC sold 40 lb bags of the same fertilizer for 9.69.I see plenty of livstock meds.I saw a wood burning stove at TSC for 100.00 less than a hardware store 8 miles from here.Same stove.

Quality Farm & Fleet that was based in Michigan and Central Tractor merged and after the merger they kept the poorest parts of both store chains and got rid of the best parts so lost business and then went bankrupt. The Former owners of Central Tractor tried to buy it back in bankrupt court but could not meat the bid TSC put in just to be able to close it down to get rid of the comopetion and the court judge in his poor wisdom thought that a couple of thousand dollars were worth more to the deptors than the business was to the public so he allowed it to go thru. They did abandon some of the CT -QF stores and in other locations moved the TSC stores in.

My wife had just been hired into management by CT when this all happened. We live in Ohio and 2 weeks after she started with CT they sent here to Georgia for a week to help set up and hire people for several new stores they were planning to open. She did not have all the paper work completed when the merger took place and with good luck because if she would have had it done then we would have been boved to the soutf just as things closed. The CT store was 47 mile one way and after the merger she transfered to the QF store 7 mile away till she saw the handwriting on the wall that they were closing. 6 month earlier saw truble and picked up app for Lowes, never turned it in when time was getting close changed date and sent in, 2 days later Lowes called and hired her, one of the few people thay have that can do 75% of the business of the store. She was working as assisant manager for a general merchandise store when she applied to CT and in 2 days they came in from out of state to see her after her normal working hours and hired her on the spot. So being in this situation I learned quite a bit about the TSC, CT & QF situation.

Not bashing but showing their displeasure over the deteriorating situation of retail stores serving a still very sizable customer base.
Can only speak of here in the northeast, but previous operations such as CT (even though flawed) were well rounded for helping their customers - ag, horse, or small property owner.
If an area had lots of dairy, the nearest store would have items such as milker inflations, sanitizer, and pulsater lube. Sales were tracked via computer to make sure high movers were well stocked and slow movers would tie up only minimal inventory dollars. Special orders could be made provided they were available from the supplier (this weakened towards the end of CT). Most of us understand that dead inventory cannot tie up valuable floor space.
I think most on this board would understand not all employees are versed on all products. The people that squeal about M starters make a ruckus in any forum they can be a part of. I also acknowledge some people abuse the customer service department to squeeze down a price a couple more pennies.
Everybody on this board would just like to see a return to sane planning. It's not in the cards that every retail venture is going to pull in Wal Mart like quarterly financials. Be satisfied a rural retail operation is pulling in good enough revenue to pay investors and EMPLOYEES a decent return. As we go into the future, people are going to learn life (for most of us) does not work like a game of monopoly.

Cornfarmer,I agree with you. If a store makes a $100 a month from the two or three old tractor guys like us that isn't even going to pay the phone bill. BUT if they are making a $100 a week from a horsey person and there are probably fifty of them buying. You know what they are going to stock up on because they are paying their bills with horse money not the few pennies from tractor guys. Makes business sense, don't it?

There isn't a store like TSC that could stay open in my part of the country on selling just old tractor parts.

I've tried TSC for fencing supplies, and their selection is weak and the prices are high. They have a decent tool section, but they are kind of expensive. I will give them credit on their heaters, though. I bought one there a couple of years ago and I think I got a pretty fair deal. For any real agricultural needs around here, most people use Agri Supply or local feed stores.

Very few people use a hand saw these days.I used to sharpen a lot of hand saws.Place l buy tools from has plenty for sale.Problem is they have hardened teeth, cant be sharpened.Many old hand saws have brittle teeth so they cant be set.I could stock my shop with good sharp used Disston hand saws and they wont sell.My hand saws are kept sharp and many times its easier to use a handsaw than getting out the extention cords for the electric saw.