Samsung has shut down its flagship Experience Store in London's Westfield Stratford shopping center. One of ten such retail locations around the country, the store was located in a prominent section of the mall and was often the first retail outlet to commence sales of devices like the Galaxy S4 and Galaxy S5.
The deconstruction of the store was noted by visitors to the mall last night:
And it's all over for the flagship #Samsung Experienced store in @westfieldstrat #signofthetimes pic.twitter.com/P03eNivsab
— Najeeb Khan (@najeebster) December 23, 2014In a statement provided to The Verge, Samsung stated that its decision to close the store would not affect the operation of the remaining Experience Stores in the UK:
We remain fully committed to the operation of the remaining nine Samsung Experience Stores across the UK, and wish to reassure our customers that those stores will not be affected by this decision.
The closure of its flagship store highlights the downturn Samsung is witnessing of late. The South Korean manufacturer had its profits eroded by 60 percent in the third quarter of 2014, and has seen sales overshadowed by local vendors in emerging markets like China.
Some of the cost-cutting measures by Samsung include a reduction in its smartphone portfolio by as much as 30 percent in 2015, followed by a decision to end sales of Chromebooks in Europe. At this stage, it is unclear as to how the downturn in sales would affect Samsung's planned retail expansion in the territory.
Reader comments
Samsung closes flagship store in London amid sales decline
The money is in the mid-range and entry-level phones and Samsung is really bad in that area. Not everyone is a 1-percenter who can buy a flagship every year. Plus in the flagship market they have o fight Apple whose users value the brand and do not really care about anything else.
Naughty Samsung offering the public a premium rate phone number to call...
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It's a shame as this was my local Samsung store. The next nearest one is an hour a way. I don't see myself going their often. I hope Samsung can turn things around next year, despite everything they still make the best android phones/tablets imo.
posted from my galaxy tab pro 10.1
Samsung is falling into the same trap that nearly killed HTC, from what I see.
I won't go into much detail, but slimming down their list of devices would be a smart move. Flooding the market works only for a short period of time before it kills. Look at HTC for proof.
I won't believe that their portfolio will be 30% slimmer until I see it.
And if anything, I'd like to see them slim down TouchWiz and debloat it further. Maybe a redesign. Saying they should ditch TouchWiz is pushing it IMHO.
(Also, yes. My avatar is Taiga.)
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Motorola seriously needs to step up their game.
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Have you even bothered using a moto x, 2013, 2014, g, e, or even a nexus 6? If not you have no clue, if anything, other manufacturers need to take a page from moto's playbook. Most solid phones in the android camp today.
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The pie is only so big. If you have more people eating it (OEMs), they get a smaller slice. Seems reasonable to me. If my memory is correct it was posted that only 10% of the Iphone6/6+ customers came from ANdroid. Most are old Iphone users. The Apple Pie is only eaten by Apple. They (Samsung) are still eating a good portion of the pie. Its just their are more pie eaters are out there. They better hope Microsoft dosen''t take off more and leave even less pie to be eaten. LOL
Product line and touchwiz needs to be change, too many watered down version of the same thing or niche devices like the k zoom and active which made sense for the galaxy s4 active but the s5 is waterproof and there's s5 active more sturdier version with lower specs, Just make one top version, then software touchwiz takes up a lot of ram and isn't as smooth and nice to look at with bloat which they've cut down on and google also has a bit of bloat nowadays unless you can delete which you should without rooting, having so many products affects the software distribution with so many to update and carriers should leave the software alone just sell phones in the UK we don't get carrier bloat but carriers still have to check and alter stuff I think.
I have no axe to grind with Samsung, some of their phones are quite nice. I have Droid Turbo and like it a lot. Samsung kept reinventing the same phone much like apple, The big difference between Apple and Samsung is if your an Apple fan you have no choice but to buy the IPhone if your an Android fan you have many choices besides Samsung. Competition is catching up to Sammy. .
Oh no. Samsung is doomed.
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I'll give my 2 cents. I work part time at a bowling alley and being a cell phone enthusiasts I cell phone watch. There are 4 cell phones I see regularly. Iphone 6 S5 Note3 and S4. Most people I know are on year 1 of a 2 year contract. To me if seems like everyone already has a sammy that wants one. I like sammy though I have a nexus 5 also. The battery life on my note3 is way better that's why it's usually my daily driver. I haven't talked to anyone that hates their samsung usually they say they love there device. That's just my 2 cents. I think samsung peeked with the s5 and sales like that won't stay that high forever.
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I think they peaked with the S4. See alot more 4's than 5's.
Samsung is falling into the same trap that sunk HTC and Sony in 2011/2012 - they are releasing too many phones that don't get supported and just don't have value. The difference is that Samsung has great hero phones and HTC and Sony didn't have a good hero phone to stop the decline until 2013 (One and Xperia Z series) and by then Samsung had conquered the market. Samsung's flagship Note and S series are great. But the Galaxy Ace, Young, Y, etc. aren't.
Why buy a mid range $300 Samsung phone when you can buy a Xiaomi Phone (Mi3/Mi4, Redmi Note, Huawei Phone (Ascend Mate) , Motorola Phone (Moto G, Moto E, Moto X), LG Nexus 4/5, etc. that offer better value and a better experience IMHO.
Look at the Samsung Galaxy Alpha - Samsung wants $500 for this phone when it has terrible battery life and an average display. Why buy this when you can get a Moto X 2013 or Nexus 4/5 for $150 less? Why not just get a One Plus One, or Xiaomi Redmi Note/Mi3/Mi4, or get a LG G2 for way less?
Samsung needs to come up with a better strategy for its mid range devices. I think they need to release 3 mid range and 3 low range devices. Release a 4.3", 4.7", and 5.5" screen mid range and low range devices that perform well. Figure what Touchwiz features that these phones can use without major hiccups.
I understand that some phones will have carrier partners/exclusives. However, some of these phones should be sold unlocked through Samsung.
Think this is just a Samsung problem? Nope! The Chinese OEM are eating away at every one and they will be the next big boys forget lg moto Sammy Sony they will end up out of the mobile scene who can compete with the prices these Chinese are knocking phones out?
using my note4 or nexus 9
Wow, someones delusional...
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This is by far the most disappointed I've ever been with Android Central. Using the Verge as a source? I'm praying to the man in the sky that this never happens again. Next time maybe you should walk up to some blind, deaf guy and get his opinion, that would be more reliable than the Verge.
I miss Richard
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Proof positive, Android devices require neither a fancy store to sell them nor a local support team to get them to work. A bit tongue in cheek, granted, but visit an Apple store and watch all the the people who can't figure out how to do whatever with their iProducts.
Um, I hope you're joking. This is proof positive that Samsung is seeing declining sales, nothing else.
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These type articles are such click bait for Samsung haters. That Benhaube guy especially. It's really sad he devotes all his extra time to complain about a cellphone company he doesn't even use so his opinions really are misdirected. Good luck with changing a giant corporation with your ultra butt hurt fan boyish whining.
Posted from my galaxy note 4 that destroys anything Motorola or Nexus related.
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I see one butthurt fanboy here, and it's not the guy sharing his opinion on what Samsung needs to do to turn around massively declining sales. This coming from a Note 4 owner.
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Wow! Someone is butthurt about Samsung bad news. I wonder how much samsung money gets share with.
Exactly!
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So this was a Samsung store right? Not a Samsung phone store. I'm sure the phones was a small part of the store itself. Besides from the sound of the area it looks like the closed the one store with the highest overhead, probably an area they should have never opened a consumer electronics store to begin with. In all honesty sounds like a smart move to me.
By the way I own zero Samsung products.
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Didn't realise it was closing, didn't have a chance to have a look the other day. I would say this is a bit of an embarrassment to Samsung and potentially counter productive. Did they honestly believe that they would get tons and tons of sales through the store? Not when most things are at full price.
It probably didn't help that the store is outside the main shopping mall.
I would say that the whole point of the store was to market their goods in an environment that promotes them in the best way. Most people are likely to buy phones via their carrier on contracts but if the store helped them to choose Samsung then the end goal is still reached even if the profit does not show up against the store.
I'm left wondering what Samsungs response to the decline of sales really is. Are they going to redouble their effects to make their devices more desirable by improving all the weak areas? Or will they just make savage cuts everywhere and ignore the reasons why some may choose to move away from the brand?
It would be all good, except Samsung themselves don't know what to do. Their answer so far with the alpha is to go back to what worked so well for them in the past, Apple. A plastic phone with some metal around will certainly save them /s.
Newsflash, Samsung overdid it with 2 many iterations of the same phone, and add to the mix that people don't upgrade every year anymore, and add to the mix new players in the smartphone market from China and sales will dwindle. And don't give me the new iPhone 6 sales, reason it did well is do to it's new form factor, and people with the smaller iPhones upgraded for the bigger screen and able to stay in the Apple ecosystem, I had a guy in my car last night with the new iPhone 6+,and he told his girlfriend that he can finally see the whole email.
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Bahahaha. Bout time Apple makes a bigger screen. Now people can read their whole email!
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Innovation right there!
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Bwahahaha!
That's real innovation right there.
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What happened to market share? I thought market shares was everything.
I was told there would be no math but here goes.
60% of 300$ is much less profit than 60% of 600$.
/s I know you are being a smartass
Posted by my soon to be retired Note 3
I was hoping not to do math this close to the holiday.....
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Me too but hey, happy holidays anyway
Posted by my soon to be retired Note 3
Finally people are realizing that every smartphone company around makes better phones than Samsung. They gained all that market share because of marketing, but didn't have the product to sustain it. Now the empire they built out of knowing how to appeal to people's emotions is crumbling down.
They still have a chance to turn things around if they want to. All they need to do is make phones people actually want. Phones that are good quality and don't creek and bend if you put any pressure on the case. They could also stop throwing the shit to the wall to see what sticks. I'll believe that Samsung slims their product line down by %30 when I see it. Until then, Samsung is just the same old Samsung in my eyes.
PS. This if my opinion, and if you are a Samsung fanboy don't reply to this cussing me out and saying how stupid I an for not throwing my money at Samsung. I won't entertain you.
Posted via the Android Central App on the 2nd Gen. Moto X
One of the reasons I don't touch a Samsung even with a long stick is their completely unstandardized hardware. It is incredibly bad that their devices fail to offer "Transatlantic" LTE, i.e. support for carriers in Europe and the US. Sony did this in 2013 with Xperia Z Ultra C6806 and C6806 as one example while a Samsung in the US must be carrier branded and purchased from that source in order to be able to use the network in question.
Another problem with this approach of theirs is the ROM incompatibility, i.e. that each version of the device requires special ROMs and in the case of carrier branded editions: no unbranding since the original ROM is the branded one (attempting to flash something for an unlocked device will cause problems).
Knox or rather the efuse paired with region locked SIMs are other problems that make them a completely uninteresting brand and we should not talk about what they do to Android.
Their design language is also pretty much a tragedy (no, "designed by nature" was not elegant even in 2012) compared to manufacturers such as Lumigon, Oppo, Sharp, Sony or Xiaomi.
Another key issue is their release of budget device after budget device paired with different iterations of their flagships (S4+ or the rumored Snapdragon 810-Note 4) instead of having a clear portfolio with standardized hardware and clearly defined target groups.
Samsung has to do many things completely different and the question is whether they are able to implement drastic changes since they would mean a totally new strategy and product design. I am afraid that escalation of commitment will play a role here, i.e. that they continue as before beside reducing their portfolio by 30%.
It would be great is Samsung would recognize the concepts of "unbranded" and "unlocked" as well, i.e. making their devices available outside the carriers.
I am not even sure that closure of their retail stores is the best strategy either since that presence is important in order to boost sales, especially in a decline.
Those are all relevant issues you mentioned to an extent, but would changing they're rom compatibility, design language, Knox, etc. take marketshare away from the Chinese OEMs selling decent hardware at rock bottom prices making razor thin profits ? That is BY FAR the biggest reason samsung has struggled to maintain this year.
They're addressing the build quality issues in case you haven't noticed, and touchwiz has been vastly improved this year. They've now been forced to slim down they're portfolio as well, so they're well on they're way to making tech enthusiasts like us happier with they're efforts. But they're bottom line is going to continue to decrease as long as xaomi and lenovo, etc. keep doing what they are.
Having said all that, the note 4 is currently the best smartphone on the market !! Lol.
I am not at all impressed by the Note 4, not because of the device itself but because of Samsung. Just the fact that I need a carrier branded one if I want to use LTE in the US kills it completely since I just consider buying a phone from a carrier, with branding and bloatware to be an unacceptable option.
So it doesn't matter what hardware the Note 4 has when it is severely crippled by Samsung policies.
Edit: A US carrier branded Note 4 is unable to use LTE in Europe usually, which make it even more no-go and I am not impressed by the software either (640 DPI TouchWiz, no thank you). I continue to rock my Xperia Z Ultra and don't see how a Note 4 could be an improvement to me.;)
Crippled? Really?
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Which Note 4 should I buy if I want LTE on T-Mobile (US) and 3 (Sweden) and Telefonica O2 (Czech Republic). My C6833 has LTE on all three carriers. I am also open for suggestions on a stable AOSP ROM for the Note 4 that keep most of the S-Pen features.
When those two things are in place, I will consider the Note 4.
Let me simply and gently explain what crippled is. Next to the definition of crippled should be an image of a Nexus 6 or a Droid Turbo.
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Severely crippled is a huge overstatement. You need to use the note 4 a bit more in depth to really see how powerful its version of touchwiz is. it's functionality and raw capability is unmatched at this point. Aesthetically, other than the lousy launcher, touchwiz also looks about 100x better than it did a year ago. Everything from the notification panel to the settings and native apps look far better. Touchwiz on the note 3 was an abomination, but samsung has made huge strides this year imo. They weren't playing around with this device. It's truly industry leading
Tech reviewers, professionals, and enthusiasts seem to share the same opinions about the note 4 for obvious reasons. It's combo of hardware, software capability, and camera make it the top dog
Exactly
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Dude I agree although NY nexus 6 is at&t branded everything I didn't want is gone!! Easy unlock root this is a solid device!! Don't want a note who the hell besides corporations wants selinux locked boot loaders and I'm quite serious I have had an Experia x10 HTC inspire HTC one x+ Gs4 now a nexus6 all of them rooted all of them running custom Roms so you can see where I agree with you :)
The support carriers over here.. I guess there is only 4 though
Listen, this is an insider tip from a former employee of Samsung Jung daegu plant. I have nothing to gain from this. I do not endorse any phone brand. But, this has to come out for the sake of every hard Working consumer... There are 40 million units of unsold galaxy s5 in warehouses globally. Samsung is not going to throw them away especially with these company profit downfall. The memo from the Samsung high executive division are going to salvage everything from the galaxy s 5 and rebrand them as the new galaxy s6.. To cut their losses.. Now, it is up to you ( the reader) to tell your friends / family about this cunning scheme. Cheers 2015...
Kinda sounds like the S4-s5!
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I've used ever phone makers devices. I prefer Samsung. I always go back to them. A lot of people do, which is why they still control the Android market. And that is my opinion
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I would say with a couple of their latest devices ie the Galaxy Alpha and Note 4 have been much better build wise. Picked up a Note 4 recently. First time I've bought a Samsung device since the Tocca and have been so impressed with the build quality.
It's Android itself where I'm finding more issues.
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I have seen a lot of people with Samsung phones, but when that contract expires they go with another brand. (LG/HTC/Apple) I guess the one and done finally caught up with them. There is next to no brand loyalty there.
If they just took the time to clean up the software and make it less cluttered and choppy they would be fine.
Yeh but its the same with LG... and HTC. The only phones that sort of have brand loyalty with android is the Nexus line really. I even considered leaving them for a nexus but the Note 4 happened.
That's far from accurate, you can't get a Note 4 to "lag" even if you tried.
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To be honest, I think they need to slim down the product lines by a lot more than 30%. There isn't sense or reason to the number of low and midrange devices they have been pushing out.
You must have a lot of Samsung hatred to write down all that.
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The Verge adding random things together as usual to create a story. Dropping sales in China; a store closes in London? Let's say they're related to create a headline. Nice to see The Verge haven't changed a bit since I last visited that site years ago.
This ^
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+1
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Yup left that site and it was a good decision.
Posted via the ACA on NEXUS 6
You do realize that Samsung self reported their sales are waaaaay down right? This is evidence.
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Actually, they reported that their profits were down 60%, due partially to lagging sales from mobile devices, partially from poor sales in the television market and partially from a massive increase in "marketing costs". They still brought in $3.9b last quarter, so they're not exactly hurting.
The drop in the mobile space wasn't "huge" although I'm sure it has Samsung re-evaluating their priorities right now, since it seems to be an accelerating trend.
The Verge is about the same level as BGR. They are the worst in this industry.
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Facts
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