Random musings and general banter.

[PhaedrusR]

"The technical difficulties" saga which EVERYONE on this thread KNEW the end was nigh begs the question if we all knew (and it wasn't hard) then don't try and tell presenters who had been there for years or even decades didn't

What should they have done?

Not sold £500+ Rattan sets on a constant loop

Point has been made before but in the dying embers of Bid Tv when it wasn't as obvious things were shortly falling apart they sold £8 all-in egg cookers on a constant loop, still not ideal but it isn't putting anybody into potential financial difficulty

The price of an item is irrelevant. £8 or £600, it's if the order is fulfilled and if the company is or isn't trading. It was trading up to the point it wasn't. Also understand Sports Direct were pressing them to sell their stuff, including rattan. And SD had a loan charge on IW. Do we know if maybe it was a condition of the loan. And there was a chance that the cash generated by high ticket items like the rattan could plug the finance hole while new funding or restructuring was done.
Sadly? It failed.
If they tried EricK and other attempts, then selling rattan was another attempt to salvage the firm. The owners had lost the plot by then!

 

[snakesnakesnake]

It would be interesting to know, perhaps from @snakesnakesnake, what information the presenters were given, and how soon they knew.

Were they given any customer stock delivery assurances by management?

Clearly MM knew the closure was happening the next day and hinted at such and effectively said goodbye and thanks for all the fish before midnight sign-off. Should he not have been selling at all. Who would they have used instead.

But where do you draw the line. Presumably most people knew the firm was in trouble for months. When would you have said no more. People received their shoes/items/orders just days before the closure, and week prior were ordering and receiving goods and afaik, they have since tried to fulfill remaining stock orders. The nightmare rattan order discussed on forum is slowly being sorted, payments stopped and refund claims happening?

So if it's just about their insensitive tones/attitude after IW closure, yes, but to say they should not be doing their jobs until closure, is stretching it. Someone had to run the business until closure. And you have to make sales to try and forestall closure. And you'd sell Sports Direct big ticket items, rattan, to maximise cashflow and profit margin. And SD were pushing for their stuff to be sold, we're told. Announcing a closing down sale would have stopped all but the most determined buyer, unless some sort of big discount and guaranteed delivery/insurance was offered, thereby exacerbating the cash/profit situation.

Presenters had no information at all. When the decision was made to come off air, which came during that final hour, it was for ‘warehouse staff to catch up with packing orders’. Management assured all staff that we would be live in a few days and so when we all turned up for work as requested just days later, it wasn’t entirely expected that we were redundant with immediate effect until we weren’t allowed inside the building..
The business was for sale, yes, but had MANY interested parties putting in offers, the company had been through this many times before so it wasn’t something to be worried about.

 

[Keep Going]

Thanks for the updates Snakesnakesnake.

Just out of interest did you see or hear any presenters in the dying days or weeks ask why the website was wonky for so long? Ask why they were selling Rattan over and over and over again with a few airfryer shows mixed in and why so many repeat shows in a short space of time?

I would have thought some presenters would have been asking some questions....we all know what work rumours are like at the best of times.

Also as mentioned a few posts back I mind one night on a show before it all started to go real south MM was on a watch hour and got very...very deep with some quote about be careful in life etc, and I gave him credit then and still believe today he was hinting at something to help the buyer, I can only be honest on what I saw so fair do's if that was the case Mike.

 

[Dr Quincy MkII]

Then, again, Ryan with his endless mother’s infirmity stories is like live on a loop. How many times he has used her inabilities to do things as part of a sales presentation, I wouldn’t like to guess.

he was talking about her selling a steam mop. He says 'I shouldn't say this but my mum smokes. She's 82 she's not going to stop now! But nicotine stains get everywhere' He was using her to flog lawnmowers the other day. I would presume if her son is popular shopping TV legend he could pay a man to do it all for her

 

[Dr Quincy MkII]

I would like some kind of update on Peter Simon. I need to know he's okay. I hate the thought of him out there, sat in that tiny blue t-shirt that shows his mid-drift, bitterly pushing the meagre content of his Jane Plan meal around the plate, staring vacantly at his life-changing Vibrapower, now thick with dust from non-use, cries of 'the best time of day show' echoing around his head…

His heart must've broken faster than an Earnshaw strap when he heard even Kevski had defected to Shop Extra

back to playing Ronald McDonald again for him

 

[Deleted member 21838]

Well, it's My Name is Den and a load of tediously dull skin tonics for the rest of the evening. Duck fat, I'm off. In fact, I'm positively rancid.

 

[snakesnakesnake]

Thanks for the updates Snakesnakesnake.

Just out of interest did you see or hear any presenters in the dying days or weeks ask why the website was wonky for so long? Ask why they were selling Rattan over and over and over again with a few airfryer shows mixed in and why so many repeat shows in a short space of time?

I would have thought some presenters would have been asking some questions....we all know what work rumours are like at the best of times.

Also as mentioned a few posts back I mind one night on a show before it all started to go real south MM was on a watch hour and got very...very deep with some quote about be careful in life etc, and I gave him credit then and still believe today he was hinting at something to help the buyer, I can only be honest on what I saw so fair do's if that was the case Mike.

Unfortunately for everyone management wanted more space in the warehouse and so rattan was on over and over again, also because it was one of the few products that were selling consistently well that had a lot of units to shift. Apparently this was to make room for new Frasers stock coming in that would mean 100s of new items to sell on shows. Of course this was a lie. Presenters complained about the same shows, as did everyone while making a few gloomy jokes about what this meant for the channel, but as I said before, the shows were making money so the jokes had no basis. Presenters were as uninformed as everyone else on the situation of the company.

 

[Keep Going]

Thanks for the quick reply Snakesnakesnake (feel bad saying snakesnakesnake haha) thank you.

 

[Herring]

Wait, I thought someone here (who I think bought the rattan) said it didn't come from the IW warehouse but was despatched from a different location, hence the issues with delivery once the company went to the wall (because IW couldn't pay them to send it, so they didn't bother).

 

[snakesnakesnake]

Wait, I thought someone here (who I think bought the rattan) said it didn't come from the IW warehouse but was despatched from a different location, hence the issues with delivery once the company went to the wall (because IW couldn't pay them to send it, so they didn't bother).

By the end we were only selling things from our warehouse which is why when the website went down we were still able to sell rattan through the eBay store as it came from onsite. This is what I believe to be the case anyway as that is what we were told is happening, I didn’t frequent the warehouse often to see stock myself but as it was an ‘in house brand’ it should’ve been in the warehouse

 

[Deleted member 21838]

Well, I respect the input of the ex-Ideal worker. If they say the presenters weren’t aware of how bad things were, you have to go with that and accept it now.

 

[harrytumkins]

yes agreed and agreed on I can't watch this "new" channel will just be the kevski watch shows for the laughs on a Monday night for me this is dire

 

[harrytumkins]

A different tangent

the "narrative" from Ryan and Co on the "new" channel perhaps implied that the "bid" lot were bad eggs not following the traditions

Why have the majority of the ex-bid lot been signed up as quickly as they probably could be by the number 2 channel in the industry? Partly it will be because of past relationships but if they were offered the gigs make no mistake Ryan and Co would be down to the Feltham studios quicker than you can say checkout your baskets

It certainly backs up (not that he needs it) what Snake has said about Peter Simon being off-screen. I have heard references to Sally on air previously on TJC not often but sometimes but have never heard any sort of comment about PS good or bad

 

[Herring]

Well, I respect the input of the ex-Ideal worker. If they say the presenters weren’t aware of how bad things were, you have to go with that and accept it now.

I'll "accept" what the ex-worker says once they can prove they worked there. Until then I'll do what I do with most things I read on the internet (or I hear coming out of shopping tv presenter's mouth ) and take it all with a pinch of salt and a touch of cynicism

Edit: I've no problem with other forums members believing the poster if their own 'bar of believability' is met.

 

[Deleted member 21838]

I suppose at a push, I could play the part of a member of staff from Ideal World or a shopping channel in general. Saying things I thought appeared credible about working there. Like many things online, and even more so in the forums side of life, you really cannot be sure who you are talking to most of the time. Or if they are playing a role or not. My gut feeling ( and that’s all I have) is what they have said displays some genuine inside knowledge of the place and the selling behind the scenes procedures. That’s what I base my view of their credibility on.

 

[Herring]

I suppose at a push, I could play the part of a member of staff from Ideal World or a shopping channel in general. Saying things I thought appeared credible about working there. Like many things online, and even more so in the forums side of life, you really cannot be sure who you are talking to most of the time. Or if they are playing a role or not. My gut feeling ( and that’s all I have) is what they have said displays some genuine inside knowledge of the place and the selling behind the scenes procedures. That’s what I base my view of their credibility on.

Which is fair enough

 

[Deleted member 21838]

A different tangent

the "narrative" from Ryan and Co on the "new" channel perhaps implied that the "bid" lot were bad eggs not following the traditions

Why have the majority of the ex-bid lot been signed up as quickly as they probably could be by the number 2 channel in the industry? Partly it will be because of past relationships but if they were offered the gigs make no mistake Ryan and Co would be down to the Feltham studios quicker than you can say checkout your baskets

It certainly backs up (not that he needs it) what Snake has said about Peter Simon being off-screen. I have heard references to Sally on air previously on TJC not often but sometimes but have never heard any sort of comment about PS good or bad

It will be interesting to see where Mason and Becque turn up shopping channel wise. Maybe the latter prefers his life coach role nowadays. Mason is the more interesting case. Clearly, someone who can sell really well, and underneath all the cheeky cockney chappie persona, a bloke with some intellectual depth to him. QVC is an unlikely venue as they might fear his ‘pronouns’ are not in tune with the yoghurt knitting PC tree culture there. You wonder if TJC will try a more general goods separate channel. - TSC perhaps? Or a dedicated watch version operation..And eventually he‘ll end up fronting a new shopping channel, with a little more survival credibility than Shop Extra.

 

[PhaedrusR]

Thanks for the updates Snakesnakesnake.

Just out of interest did you see or hear any presenters in the dying days or weeks ask why the website was wonky for so long? Ask why they were selling Rattan over and over and over again with a few airfryer shows mixed in and why so many repeat shows in a short space of time?

I would have thought some presenters would have been asking some questions....we all know what work rumours are like at the best of times.

Also as mentioned a few posts back I mind one night on a show before it all started to go real south MM was on a watch hour and got very...very deep with some quote about be careful in life etc, and I gave him credit then and still believe today he was hinting at something to help the buyer, I can only be honest on what I saw so fair do's if that was the case Mike.

Yes @S C O I also got that from MM on the penultimate day where he was stressing credit/consumer rights, moneyback methods, before thanking all and sundry and signing off.

So while I take @snakesnakesnake info at face value, I'm sure there must have also been rumours and nods and winks that the time was rapidly approaching and the end was nigh for IW, albeit with ongoing attempts to find new owners, investment or financing.

Like any organisation, group of people, there's alway cliques, those in the know and those outside, who get told more or know more than others, so the rumour mill must have suspected things would change soonest. I reckon some presenters who had the ear of the owners/management would have known more about what was going on.

 

[harrytumkins]

There was an "incident" of a staff member coming on this forum a little while ago now for another channel and it didn't take long for the aggression and insults to fly then they were banned the same evening

So far "snake" has given a very balanced view including some critical comments

Can't really see what they would have gained they are not portraying themselves as anybody this forum would know of

 

[PhaedrusR]

yes agreed and agreed on I can't watch this "new" channel will just be the kevski watch shows for the laughs on a Monday night for me this is dire

Yep, me too, I looked at the SE channel at 6:05pm, saw it was all collagen and beauty creams all night and left at 6:06pm.