Turnkey and Sound Control (UK) go into administration

[Timo]

Turnkey being the UK's biggest music-tech chain, formerly UK distributor for Access Music (the role of which Digital Village now have).

Sound Control bought Turnkey out a few years ago, along with Soho Sound House, and Media Tools. Now they've all gone under.

http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/page/s...news_id/e/2112
http://www.dv247.com/news/Turnkey%20...tration/131759

160+ people have lost their jobs. =/

"Sound Control Group appoints adminstrators

Apr 30 2008
John Reid and Bill Dawson of Deloitte, the business advisory firm, have been appointed Administrators of Sound Control Holdings Limited (“Holdings”) and certain of its subsidiaries (“the Group”) following applications to the courts by the Group’s Directors.

The Group operates from 26 stores across the UK, under the brand names Sound Control, Media Tools, Turnkey and Soho Sound House, and is the largest musical instrument retailer in the UK. It has a turnover of £50m and 338 employees nationwide.

The Group has been impacted by increased competition from the internet and the directors had been pursuing a strategy to sell the business. This did not prove successful and accordingly they sought the appointment of John Reid and Bill Dawson as Administrators.

John Reid said: “Following a review of the Group’s operations the Administrators have today made the difficult decision to close 10 of the Group’s trading locations and bring to an end its telesales and internet sales activities. These changes to the Group’s operations have resulted in 163 redundancies with immediate effect.

“The Administrators welcome interest in the business and assets of the Group and are already in discussions with a number of interested parties to explore a possible sale.

“However, at the same time as they explore sale options, the Administrator will continue to trade the remaining 16 stores, selling high quality musical instruments to the public.”

The Group's head office is based in Dunfermline and has various trading locations throughout the UK." "

Guess we now know why the TIs were so cheap there earlier this year (my prediction at that time was an impending TI mk2 release, as they were previously UK's distributor for Access), as they were shifting back stock and refurbs and had no new ones on order.

[Shambler]

I have/had a Sound Control near me in Ipswich UK but I always found them to be very expensive e.g. V-Synth GT I bought for £1695, Sound Control Price £1900

These days you have to be very competitive to survive, like Digital Village, people will go to the cheapest reputable seller they can find.

[DIGITAL SCREAMS]

I bought my Virus TI from them for £1349.00 as they were having a sale (10% off everything weekend).

But letme get this straight......their London shop will remain open right? That was the only store I shopped with.....I didnt realise they had like 26 outlets.

I do feel sorry for the 160+ who lost their jobs.

DS

[F5D]

Sad news.

A couple of months ago, I started to order gear from UK because the prices are good there. I received my 828 mk3 and some other things from DV247 and was planning to purchase a moog little phatty from turnkey soon but it seems that I will not. I hope DV will start selling moog synths in UK now.

[Timo]

10 stores have closed, the rest (16) are under control of the administration. No orders can be placed, and telephone sales will cease.

The remaining outlets are still trading publicly in order to sell off the rest of the stock from all the original outlets. They're not ordering any new stock.

http://www.soundonsound.com/news?NewsID=10049

There's a massive thread on SoS discussing it, too. It has hugely widespread implications and spin-off effects.

[johnmayer]

Browse and Apply to numerous Sales Administration at http://www.octopusmtr.co.uk, the motor trade recruitment website of
Octopus MTR.

[Ceri JC]

There are six Reverb stores open, which as someone else mentioned, are effectively rebadged Sound Control ones. I bought my Snow from the Bristol store and was very impressed with them and their service. The manager even brought his own TI in from home for me to demo as they didn't have a demo model in stock!