American Science & Surplus Is Fighting For Its Life (arstechnica.com) 46
"One of the few major independent science-surplus/DIY outlets left is American Science & Surplus," writes longtime Slashdot reader Tyler Too. "They've recently launched a GoFundMe campaign to ensure their survival." Ars Technica reports: Now, nearly 90 years after its launch selling "reject lenses" as American Lens & Photo, American Science & Surplus is facing an existential threat. The COVID-19 pandemic and increased costs hit the business hard, so the store has launched a GoFundMe campaign looking to raise $200,000 from customers and fans alike. What's happening in suburban Chicago is a microcosm of the challenges facing local retail, with big-box retailers and online behemoths overwhelming beloved local institutions. It's a story that has played out countless times in the last two-plus decades, and owner Pat Meyer is hoping this tale has a different ending. Ars reports on American Science & Surplus' long history, noting that it was founded in 1937 and has grown from a modest surplus shop into a beloved, quirky institution for makers, science enthusiasts, and curiosity seekers. Over the decades, it evolved far beyond its original niche of lenses and lab equipment. As Meyer, a 41-year veteran of the company, put it: "I've done everything in the company that there is to do... it's been my life for 41 years."
Once known for its robust telescope section and deep inventory of scientific odds and ends, the store has adapted to shifting consumer habits -- some changes bittersweet. True to its DIY spirit, American Science & Surplus is described as a "physical manifestation of the maker ethos," stocked with everything from motors to military gas masks to mule-branding kits. It also carries a rare sense of humor, with quirky signage like a warning that a "Deluxe Walking Cane" is "not the edible kind of cane."
Today, American Science & Surplus faces modern challenges like relocating a costly warehouse and overhauling outdated software and web infrastructure. But Meyer is optimistic, noting that contributions to their GoFundMe campaign represent more than financial help: "It's about supporting local retail during a very challenging time. Who wants to buy everything at Amazon, Walmart, Temu, and Target?"
Once known for its robust telescope section and deep inventory of scientific odds and ends, the store has adapted to shifting consumer habits -- some changes bittersweet. True to its DIY spirit, American Science & Surplus is described as a "physical manifestation of the maker ethos," stocked with everything from motors to military gas masks to mule-branding kits. It also carries a rare sense of humor, with quirky signage like a warning that a "Deluxe Walking Cane" is "not the edible kind of cane."
Today, American Science & Surplus faces modern challenges like relocating a costly warehouse and overhauling outdated software and web infrastructure. But Meyer is optimistic, noting that contributions to their GoFundMe campaign represent more than financial help: "It's about supporting local retail during a very challenging time. Who wants to buy everything at Amazon, Walmart, Temu, and Target?"
Conspicuously Absent (Score:5, Informative)
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Looking at their sparse and weird product listing, I can see why they might be in financial trouble. You would think that a store called "American Science" would have a good selection of solar panels for experiments, but when you do a search on that, you only get one real option for a 100mA panel and a handful of solar flood lights.
Likewise, I did a search for 3D printers and found NO printers available and only one roll of filament. But... they have a selection of lawn statues. Why, I don't know.
Re:Conspicuously Absent (Score:5, Interesting)
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Their primary business is buying and reselling surplus. Think one of those TV shows where people buy abandoned storage units, except commercial liquidation auctions instead of random people's junk.
I buy stuff from them fairly regularly, and once in a while they have something amazing or a real bargain, but you have to treat it more like a flea market than a store. I got some used 12x48 RGB video wall display panels for example, and deeply regret only buying four of them...
=Smidge=
If you need a $200,000 GoFundMe (Score:3)
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Brother, could you spare a million? Just until I am back on my feet...
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Considering banks regularly receive taxpayer money to stay afloat, perhaps their business model needs an adjustment.
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Banks leak money like sieves. Every bank is legally allowed to lose $x per day without announcing it publicly to avoid panic.
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Obviously, you're not a nerd, or you'd have known about them... nor do you seem to, now. Go away, this websites for nerds only, not idiot trolls.
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I don't think they were that good at reading.
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Yeah, the first thought that came to mind was that maybe they're in trouble because the company is A.S.S.
I didn't hit the gofundme but I did buy something (Score:3)
I like stores like this (Score:4, Interesting)
I wish I had a few stores like this where I live. Walking through them and seeing all the random stuff gets the mind flowing and ideas brewing. Reminds me of what Radio Shack used to be back in the 70s and 80s and the other electronics shops that used to exist.
Old man rambles (Score:4, Interesting)
One of the things that saved me was an army surplus store in the bigger down down the road. Aside from enormous tents and bayonets and such, the owner was a Ham, and sold radio-relevant stuff, too.
He was a surprisingly nice guy, and over time he encouraged me through getting my license, drilling me on Morse (this was back then) and teaching me about basic electronics theory. I ended up hanging out there quite a bit and did odd jobs for him.
I was saving for my own radio when he called us one day, saying he had something to show me. It was an old radio he said was pulled from a WWII airplane, and he'd give it to me if I built the buck circuit to power it - I remember the radio was a 28 volt system. He verified I wasn't going to burn myself down with what I came up with, - I didn't really trust myself with AC, and my mother certainly didn't.
That radio was a lifeline for me. A little window where I could talk to random folks from all over, reminding me that tiny town was just that. The most common response from other kids was, "Well, what do they have that we don't?" It seemed to be a mantra there, this weird shared inferiority complex.
I moved away for school, then my family left. The only time I've been back there was for his funeral, and I still kick myself for not making time to visit him before he died.
(The radio was destroyed in a move. First time I paid someone to move houses and they somehow crushed it.)
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Yep, I was one of the town nerds too. Started in electronics, then computer programming and finally HAM related activities. Radio Shack and the local electronics stores were my equivalent to your surplus store. The managers let me play with anything and everything.
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Another loss. (Score:1)
I shopped there many years ago when things like magnets were not in every stop-n-rob. Before WWW was a thing we shopped using these things called 'catalogs' and 'mail'. Finding some obscure items was often difficult, but little specialty companies like this filled the needs. To be honest I was surprised to read that they still exist at all.
I love these stores, but... (Score:3)
*HOWEVER*, I actually blame the stores themselves for their current predicament. I remember prices in surplus stores going way, way up in the mid 2000's. Would I buy a cool old oscilloscope of unknown condition for $75? You betcha. Would I blow $350 on it? No... No I wouldn't.
The price increases are the reason I stopped going. The whole point of surplus was "cool old shit in bulk for a bargain". Once the value proposition was gone, I stopped caring.
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I absolutely love these kind of stores... they were the backbone of my younger self getting all kinds of cool old random stuff.
I find that my older self can usually scratch that itch in the middle aisle of ALDI. There aren't many shops where you can find a bench drill between branded pesto and multipacks of baby wipes.
Tech moves too fast for hobbyist surplus (Score:2)
Back in the 70s we had a few of these mail-order places. ISTR a place called "Molly's" that sold a fair amount of remaindered parts like passives, LEDs and some subassemblies. I've been to All Electronics (they had two locations, the other one was on Vermont St. in Koreatown, Los Angeles...parking was fun) a few times for oddities specialty connectors for WW2 radio equipment and high-power tapped (i.e. adjustable) wire-wound resistors. Most of these places had fun mail order catalogs.
Parts evolve so fast th
Until this Submission (Score:2)
I'd never heard of them. As someone else said, "why didn't you post a URL to them?" Jeez.
They seem to be a kindly ebay-ish supplier of odds and ends.
MST3K, while epic in so many ways, was supplanted by the Internet and YouTube. Sad.
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I'd never heard of them. As someone else said, "why didn't you post a URL to them?" Jeez.
This is Slashdot. So no one else is going to hear about them either .
Hardly Surprising (Score:2, Insightful)
As someone who shopped here as a teenager (Score:3)
American Science and Surplus was actually a good source of novelty items, optics, gears and surplus commercial devices in a time before the internet.
They had virtually everything in mass quantity, along with humorous descriptions to accompany their wares.
Iâ(TM)m actually surprised that they didnâ(TM)t shutter their doors in the early 2000â(TM)s, after ebay and other direct to consumer web sites made it much easier to find surplus items.
I donâ(TM)t know why they talk about temu or anything like that. ASS is/was more of a combination of harbor freight, edmund optics, and govplanet. There was very little there that would have been in competition with direct to consumer chinese sites.
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I used to buy stuff from AS&S back in the day. I went to their web site to see if there was anything I might order to help stave off the wolves. But most of it is utter crap. The actual surplus goods are down to almost nothing. And the utter crap is really, truly, utter crap, like stuff bought from AliExpress.
Perhaps it is a result of supply --- lean manufacturing means there should no longer be large quantities of interesting stuff on the B2B surplus market, cutting off places like AS&S (and Al
Hard times for a wonderful institution (Score:1)
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Their catalog is a work of art. Even if you don't buy anything (But you should! It's cheap! And good!) it's really fun to read.
Definitely! Similar vibes to (but pre-dating) Trader Joe's "Fearless Flyer", right down to the cheap paper and retro graphics.
Fond memories (Score:2)
Visiting their original storefront in Chicago was one of my favorite excursions when I was young and in need of science fair inspiration or just "stuff" for one of my personal projects.
Pretty much all the B&M and online surplus electronics stores I used to buy from have faded away or moved to a purely eBay existence.
Edmund Scientific still in business - neat stuff (Score:1)
Now Edmund Optics and still in business with lots of good stuff. As a kid I bought from Edmund Scientific. https://www.edmundoptics.com/ [edmundoptics.com]
A store for how we USED to shop (Score:2)
Unfortunately very nearly nobody shops like that any more. We have a chain of surplus stores where I live, and the last several times I've gone in I've walked back out empty handed as they didn't have anything I wanted. They had plenty of things that other people want, but nothi
Broken business model... The customers are gone. (Score:2)
Part of the problem is we no longer have that tinkerer mentality in the hardware space. What we do have is somewhat curated, ala 3d printing, Ada Fruit, etc... Most consumer electronics are locked down, and much of our manufacturing that lead to these interesting shops has been off-shored, so the supply dries up. It's been a slow progression much of my life.
Edmund Scientific went full commercial. A little 1cm Ronchi ruling to figure a telescope is now in the $100's...
Fry's Electronics is gone.
Al Lasher's
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Both of those are gone now, of course.
I bought a console table with an embedded 8" trackball (from an old radar station) and spent weeks trying to make use of it. Never found a way to, but I enjoyed the attempt. For all the chatter about 'maker culture' and such, I think the earlier comment about technology moving too fast for
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Weird Stuff Warehouse in Sunnyvale. Between them and Halted Supply Company
Weird Stuff was always an interesting place to visit. Halted was a bit different if I'm remembering correctly, I think I only made it there once or twice, and once as a seller.
Another fun thing in the Bay Area maker / techie junk scene was the GSA surplus sales they used to do at Lawrence Lab out in Livermore. I actually picked up a fully functional 19" rack mount ion-gauge controller for high-vacuum (think 10^-6 Torr or higher) chambers for under $100. I cleaned it up, tested it, and sold it to Halted f
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My favorite of the genre (OK, I've only been to two) was Weird Stuff Warehouse in Sunnyvale. Between them and Halted Supply Company, there was so much to imagine making use of.
Both of those are gone now, of course.
Those were the days. Ham Radio Outlet and Computer Literacy Bookstore were nearby as well.
Might be fun to visit in person, but whatever. (Score:2)
On their website there was nothing that would make me look past the first couple pages.
I'll stick with Archie McPhee's. https://mcphee.com/ [mcphee.com]
Remembering (Score:1)
My grandfather signed us up for the AS&S catalog when I was a kid and I remember him sitting with me as we looked at every page. So many good memories attached to this place. As of writing it looks like they might meet their fund drive. I also want to tell those people who are not able to do a donation is to go buy something from them. Every little bit helps.