I just had a call from a friend who tells me that George Whites just shut up shop for financial reasons! Anybody else heard this? :o
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I just had a call from a friend who tells me that George Whites just shut up shop for financial reasons! Anybody else heard this? :o
Am investigating now :D
I was about to go get some bits and bobs
Sad to say but the doors are locked! No staff are there....... Its been on the cards for a while as they have been losing money hand over fist on Finacial House....
possibly another big loss for Motorcycling... :(
Hope its not as it seems. Alot of friends work there and they bring alot of business to Swindon..
Bad news, real surprise! I'm heading over yours for some fs365 no Mike!!
i was there on saturday and the bargain section was closed and it was all in the main section! they were quite low on sizes and did have a lot of stuff at very low prices! for example, shoei helmets rrp £419.99 they were selling them for £99 but only had XXS left (shame because i think i need an XS and they were very nice helmets :()
although im not a fan of the ride to gws i like the occasional visit to look at the nice bikes and possibly get a bargain :P
Confirmed 100% official... :(
is it the whole of gws or just the swindon outlet?
Its the whole lot...
That's a big shame indeed :(
Gutted,another business bits the dust,terrible shame >:(
geez, that's a huge business to go down the pan. Wonder who is buying the stock...
...................... :-X
wow bad news indeed
"Those who ignore the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them..." I don't recall to whom that quote is attributed, but apparently nobody at GW was familiar with it... Witness the late 90s and massive expansion by M&P, Carnell, Motorcycle City, Riossi, all followed by a big crash as they realised that they'd over-expanded and the market wasn't there to sustain it all.
It is sad news though. I have no great love for GW, they've rarely failed to disappoint when I've dealt with them, but all the same there are plenty of people who'll lose their jobs and a motorcycling landmark will be gone, at least in the short term... :(
Arghhh I have my bike booked in for the Honda Service there soon! now I have to go to Abingdon!
Reading further into this. Looks like they have closed 4 branches.
Slough, London & 2 in Cornwall. The shop is still trading online.
I have the feeling lots of companies are going to the wall this year :-/
A trip to GW's was always a good excuse to go for a ride :(
I think alot of companies will but not my shop! 8-)
What Scotty has said is 100% correct!
So anyone want to start up a small bike dealership in swindon?
yes please.....
Now we'll have to ride to Mikkies shop not GW! ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Swanny
Pop the kettle on mate!
I'm not surprised, they got too greedy, simple!
I only recently started going to Fowlers and staff there are so much more helpful compared to GW staff. :-/
I do feel for staff that have been made redundant tho :(
Now we'll have to ride to Mikkies shop not GW! ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Advrider
Pop the kettle on mate! [/quote]
sounds a far better idea!!! Never liked GW's :)
Now we'll have to ride to Mikkies shop not GW! ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Jon_W
Pop the kettle on mate! [/quote]
sounds a far better idea!!! Never liked GW's :)[/quote]
& PLUS 1 to that Jon!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Swanny
really? it was a **** location to ride to! Now somewhere like 3x Motorcycles in ringwood...there's a dealership surrounded by awesome riding roads right to the front door.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dabz
really? it was a **** location to ride to! Now somewhere like 3x Motorcycles in ringwood...there's a dealership surrounded by awesome riding roads right to the front door. [/quote]
+1. Zigzag hil!!!!!! :D
Feel sorry for the floor staff, all out of a job, but as has been said they'd over spent stupidly with millions of quid's worth of bikes and kit so I don't think it's that big a surprise really.
Good for the smaller dealers though! I Expect Mikkie and the Triumph shop will see a good increase in trade and hopefully I will as well.
Wish I had the money to open a small biker cafe somewhere near by. There will now be a lot of bikers looking for somewhere new to go this year.
one day we'll open the Wiltshire Bikers Cafe...
Bloody shame..they had some great bargains on their sale days but the Swindon branch was a pig of a place to get to at the best of times
Lets hope that somebody buys up the business and saves those jobs..every time a bike dealer/accessory place closes down it just gives the large outfits the monopoly and they shove up the prices accordingly >:(
Fowlers Of Bristol..my opinion after a lot of dealings with them..superb choice of bikes and good deals to be had if you haggle with the few decent saleguys and not the pearly toothed ones with bad haircuts and putrid breath..very pukingly nice to you when buying brand new...mmmmmmm...thats about it..
Hideously expensive..servicing is f**king dire and nearly cost me my life in 2010..bike gear so pricey you would need to flog a kidney to buy any of it and i wouldnt touch one of their used bikes as they are ****e and will no doubt break down a few days after the 1 month warranty expires :(
GW is going to hit Swindon fairly hard on the biker front. ( They had over 4000 visitors per month)
It was a big attraction and every local business did well from it. passing trade and all that..
I have my new shop being built currently and it will hold 3 times the stock so hopefully it wont hit us to hard! :-/ We should be ok, we generally have staff that say hello and would you like a cuppa...
Fowlers - You will always get mixed reviews....As im sure everyone is aware.
( i dont personally like them). But whatever trade you are in, you cant please everyone...
Who hasnt ever moaned or been a pain in someones ass?!?!?
Silence............ as i suspected... ;D
Bollocks, I was halfway through buying some stuff when their site went down due to 'maintenance' >:(
I would say dont buy anything... You may not receive it.... ;)
If it went down before you completed then that's a good thing.Quote:
I was halfway through buying some stuff when their site went down due to 'maintenance'
Not if I beat you first :-)Quote:
Originally Posted by Dabz
I know of a nice tidy building in Swindon going cheap, built in cafe upstairs etc.
All we would need is Beamer running it and it would make a fortune :-)
On a serious note: if you look at the H Cafe, Loomies or even the Ace Cafe (which is in a really crap place) all you need is an old cafe with good parking and a big Biker friendly notice and it would stand a good chance of doing well.
We (bikers) are always looking for a place to ride to.
If WB ever invested it would be really well supported.
I'm off to look for a suitable place on Google :-)
G
.. over-trading ... classic way to insolvency.. (worked in Insolvency for couple of years when in practice ) .. not nice having to tell staff, none of who's fault it is, that they are being made redundant .. even worse for them when Administrators called in at last moment and staff have no inkling.
Lots of businesses aren't saveable by an Administrator (called in by Directors) or even a Receiver (appointed by a creditor - usually a bank) because that action wasn't taken soon enough ... absolutely not saying that that is the case for GW's as don't know the detail.
But sometimes if an Insolvency Practitioner gets called in earlier then there is more of the business to save .. or it's a more attractive proposition to sell on some or all of the business as a going concern if that option is open to the IP.
Very sad though for the very many members of staff that have lost their jobs today.
Wonder if that exec car business in the service workshop car park is also linked to GW ? .. normally if the parent company fails it can have a snowball effect with subsidiary businesses previously reliant on parent company support in terms of bank cross-guarantees etc.
Tut Tut.. I think they were recently purchased by a certain business mans mate.... Just like Budget Bikes were in December.... ;)