September 30: The Rise and Fall of Circuit City (Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond)
January 17, 2014
One of the great success stories of American retailing, Circuit City got its start in 1949 as a tiny storefront in Richmond, Va. From that modest beginning, founder Sam Wurtzel quickly built the company into a national chain, and his son Alan turned it into a household name. By 2000, Circuit City employed more than 60,000 people at 616 locations across the United States.
Circuit City is also one of American retailing's great failures. In November 2008, the 59-year-old company filed for bankruptcy. Within months, it closed its stores and liquidated more than $1 billion worth of merchandise, and on March 8, 2009, the last...