Foppin Excellent (Fopp)

Member Name: jmorley99

Product:	Fopp
Date:	06/03/02 (81 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good value, Good selection

Disadvantages: Not one near me

I visited Fopp for the first time about 2 weeks ago when I stumbled across the Nottingham branch. Now as I have said I have never been in Fopp before or even heard of it for that matter, so this opinion is a first timers view and only represents one purchase from the store.

The shop drew my attention firstly because of it’s strange unique name and the colourful signage outside, then once I realised it was a music shop I had to go in. I am a CD junkie buying at least 1 a week and giving me a collection of nearly 300 pretty good going considering I am only 21.

Any way once inside I was suitably impressed with the store layout, the store seemed very spacious and the isles were clearly labelled and logically ordered. There is nothing worse than having to look through a load of trashy R&B and garage to find what your looking for. They had a wide and varied selection of titles both old and new, but form what I could see no singles.

Another factor, which added to how impressed I was of Fopp, was the low prices of older CD’s. These are often the bane of my life; I regularly get into a band with their most recent album, and end up buying the whole of their back catalogue. Shopping around is always the name of the game but with the big names such as HMV and Virgin having the widest selection and also the highest prices, getting a good deal on older releases isn’t always easy. I have seen numerous titles such as most of the Nirvana, Foo Fighters, Gomez and Weezer albums retailing for £16.99 in HMV which is just ridiculous. Fopp had an excellent selection of bargains starting from as little as £5, from what I could gather these prices were fixed and not just one off sales as with the likes of HMV. The internet in my view will still be the cheapest place to buy new release CD’s but the cheapest sites never seem to have what I am looking for, this is where Fopp excelled.

The staff were, from what I could gathe
r knowledgeable about the products and artists and upon purchasing my title were friendly and efficient, which is all I ask for in simple one off purchases.

To conclude my first visit to Fopp was a breath of fresh air, with competitive prices and a nice browsing atmosphere. It is just unfortunate that my nearest branch is in Nottingham and I am in Leicester otherwise I could see myself being on first name terms with the staff in no time. I will be checking out their website www.fopp.co.uk in the near future, I may even write an opinion on it.

Summary: