Dealerscope What They're Thinking.

Ivey on the U.S. CE Recession, China’s Inflation and Protecting Free Trade
July 01, 2008
(As told to Janet Pinkerton):

The electronics industry has been in a recession for over six months.

There’s going to be great opportunity in our industry today, but there’s going to be two kinds of businesses this...

What They’re Thinking: Parker Brugge
June 05, 2008
My father worked for DuPont for 30 plus years. I remember the challenges with his job back in that time, when I was teenager in the 70s. In the 60s and 70s, it was acceptable to dispose of your waste in the ground, in the lagoons. I remember my father...

What They’re Thinking: Jon Robbins, HiFi House Group, Broomall, Pa.
May 07, 2008
My dad started as a truck driver, then became a traffic manager for a trucking company. He was a hustler. The owner had a bunch of trucks that weren’t running, and my dad got the guy’s business back in gear. He asked for a raise, and...

What They’re Thinking: Chip Player
April 03, 2008
At the ACC (Atlantic Coast Conference) finals last weekend, I was walking to my seat and sold two LCD panels on the way. You become the business that way because people recognize you as Queen City. You become a walking billboard in town.

We...

What They’re Thinking: Lorne Schmunk
March 14, 2008
Retail is about understanding human nature. Those individuals who understand that principle learn retail very quickly while those who don’t struggle. There is no better place to learn human nature than selling on a retail floor. What I am...

Eddie Maloney, President, Cowboy Maloney’s Electric City, Jackson, Miss.
February 07, 2008
My parents taught me the harder you work, the luckier you get. My father had a gas station in Washington, D.C. He had some health issues, so they moved back home to Jackson and he got into the millwork business, then the homebuilder business....

What They’re Thinking: CES Founder Jack Wayman
December 13, 2007
Jack Wayman, 85, founder of CES, on the history of consumer electronics, life and other things

I was an only child. Miami in the 1920s was a nice place to grow up in if you could get over the mosquitoes and the scorpions. Grew up in a very close...

Murray Huppin
December 06, 2007
From the time I was four years old, I wanted to own the family business. I loved being there. It wasn’t even a hi-fi store then, just a store selling musical instruments and a couple of cameras. I loved retail. I loved being with my dad,...

What They’re Thinking: Kathy Gornik
December 03, 2007
Kathy Gornik, President and Marketing Director, Thiel Loudspeakers, Lexington, Ky., celebrating 30 years in industry this year.

First job in the industry: Starting my own company. I just created my own job.

Starting Thiel didn’t...

David B. Lorsch
November 12, 2007
My first job in the CE industry was working in a warehouse of Musicraft in Chicago. I was a stock boy. I'd pull systems, receivers, speakers, wire, disc washers and turntables. The turntable had to be assembled: the base, dust cover, hinges; mount...