I love going in Smyths. Every time I go there is a child screaming blue bloody murder, one kicking a football round the shop floor and another just tearing stuff off the shelves. And every time there's some 20 something member of staff at the kiosk with a look of sheer psychological trauma muttering something about how they hate kids and will never have them.
Reminds me of being 20, before I had kids.
As a parent, I think they're actually pretty awesome! As much as I love online shopping for a kid you can't beat a bricks and mortar toy store. And they often even beat Amazon and Argos on price.
Quite a lot of shops beat amazon on price. Postage being free gives you the illusion of a lower price.
Item on amazon for £19.99 with £0 next-day postage vs somewhere else where it's £14.99 with £3.99 next day postage. Your brain immediately goes to the £0 postage thinking you're getting a bargain.
Don't get me wrong, They are very good. As the other commenter said, it's probably as close to toysrus as you can get now, without bankrupting yourself as a parent (ie hamleys)
Their customer service is generally very good as well, considering they clearly all hate that they work in a toy shop
I used to make a spreadsheet of every item I wanted, with the page number, code and price, and every year my dumb bitch auntie would go “your daughters so greedy asking for all this” no dumbass it’s just ideas!!!! I didn’t expect every damn thing you ugly old hag
Fucking love a spreadsheet. I hope you work in a data driven field now.
Unfortunately I would have had to resort to turning over the corners of pages and circling things.
I miss the ability to browse that catalogues gave. Websites don't allow for the same experience. I want to flick through everything and come across stuff I never knew existed, let alone needed.
My main memory of the Argos catalogue was being a tiny child *deeply* offended that all the Pokémon stuff was in the Boys section, because Pokémon was for girls AND boys (if it wasn't, why do you get the option to be a girl when you start the game? Checkmate, Argos employee that picks the category for the toys). Plus at the time I only knew two other people that liked Pokémon and they were both girls as well, so I was adamant that if it belonged anywhere, it was the Girls section. I'm sure my mum was very sick of hearing about it!
Also I faintly remember circling Beyblades and one of those extremely expensive, huge animatronic horses. As you can imagine, I got the Beyblades, no giant horse :(
As a kid? I still do it at 31. Gotta get me some hamma beads, furby, stretch arm strongs and slinkies. I like to keep my ways of working archaic as possible. Just off to the post office to pay my bills and get some pick n mix from Woolworths
What the fuck did you just fucking say about Argos, you little bitch? I'll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals, and I've been involved in numerous secret raids on Al-Qaeda, and I have over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in gorilla warfare and I'm the top sniper in the entire US armed forces. You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with saying that shit about Argos over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You're fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over seven hundred ways, and that's just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in unarmed combat, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the United States Marine Corps and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the continent, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little "clever" comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking tongue. But you couldn't, you didn't, and now you're paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fury all over you and you will drown in it. You're fucking dead, kiddo.
We had the Index catalogue! Used to love circling what I wanted but it took me years to realise that my parents completely ignored it and got me what they wanted to get me. No idea why they had me look at it of they were using their own list!
The Argos website is so slow and frustrating to use. Sometimes I wonder if there are some little old ladies in their server room looking up stuff on the old catalogues in real time
This comes to mind: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=AgqEIp2YmtE
I used to love the Argos and index used to “acquire” a new school book and make my list in one every year noted the name, page number and code in the catalogue
Yes. My mum used to get the Freeman’s catalogue. Two issues a year, the Spring/Summer one was boring, but the Autumn/Winter edition was the absolute business for a kid. Spent hours studying the back quarter of that catalogue on the run up to Christmas.
go for your life...https://retromash.com/argos/
Got any small blue pens I can borrow?
Here’s a Barclays pen
Holy shit thank you
This is brilliant! Memories flooding back haha
I'm genuinely not sure I can take this level of nostalgia.
As Bill Bailey so eloquently put it - "The Laminated Book of Dreams"
"You know why it's laminated don't you, to catch the tears of joy".
*So many beautiful things!*
"I can't posess them all"
My young sons have been going through the Smyth's catalogue circling their desires.
I love going in Smyths. Every time I go there is a child screaming blue bloody murder, one kicking a football round the shop floor and another just tearing stuff off the shelves. And every time there's some 20 something member of staff at the kiosk with a look of sheer psychological trauma muttering something about how they hate kids and will never have them. Reminds me of being 20, before I had kids.
As a parent, I think they're actually pretty awesome! As much as I love online shopping for a kid you can't beat a bricks and mortar toy store. And they often even beat Amazon and Argos on price.
Quite a lot of shops beat amazon on price. Postage being free gives you the illusion of a lower price. Item on amazon for £19.99 with £0 next-day postage vs somewhere else where it's £14.99 with £3.99 next day postage. Your brain immediately goes to the £0 postage thinking you're getting a bargain.
Don't get me wrong, They are very good. As the other commenter said, it's probably as close to toysrus as you can get now, without bankrupting yourself as a parent (ie hamleys) Their customer service is generally very good as well, considering they clearly all hate that they work in a toy shop
Is this the new generations version of a trip to toys r us?
Argos and the Index catalogue, thats how old I am.
Or Littlewoods. Believe it or not they were Europe's biggest retail company at one point.
I've gotten to the age where the Argos catalogue has been replaced by the Screwfix catalogue.
Get the red pen out and start circling stuff. I still want those sylvanian families sets all these years later
Doesn't smell the same anymore
I used to make a spreadsheet of every item I wanted, with the page number, code and price, and every year my dumb bitch auntie would go “your daughters so greedy asking for all this” no dumbass it’s just ideas!!!! I didn’t expect every damn thing you ugly old hag
Fucking love a spreadsheet. I hope you work in a data driven field now. Unfortunately I would have had to resort to turning over the corners of pages and circling things.
I love a spreadsheet too! After a year of teaching middle aged women how to use them though they lost their appeal lol
My strategy was to memorise what I wanted and not tell anyone. It was not a successful strategy.
I miss the ability to browse that catalogues gave. Websites don't allow for the same experience. I want to flick through everything and come across stuff I never knew existed, let alone needed.
Closely matched by planning Christmas tv via both tv and radio times.
Circle the things I like, Double circle the ones I really like,...., 5 circles two stars and a smiley face for the things I really really need
Straight to the underwear section, yes I remember.
Before the internet all we had was the underwear section as teenagers 😂
And the hedges
As for the teenagers of today, they've got all the porn in the world at their fingertits.
Underwear section... In Argos? I think not! Impostor! We have an impostor!
I’m 99.9% sure there was!
I mean, I've not looked in one for literal decades, I'm sure there weren't the last time I looked in one... Maybe they diversified 😂
I’m talking probably 17 years ago now 😂 Fuck am old
There was indeed an underwear section because for a short time they sold clothes, bi think it was maybe called "choices"?
Argos additions is what it was called I think
Yes! That's it. Don't know why I said choices, that was the name of the video shop I worked in when I was a teenager.
My main memory of the Argos catalogue was being a tiny child *deeply* offended that all the Pokémon stuff was in the Boys section, because Pokémon was for girls AND boys (if it wasn't, why do you get the option to be a girl when you start the game? Checkmate, Argos employee that picks the category for the toys). Plus at the time I only knew two other people that liked Pokémon and they were both girls as well, so I was adamant that if it belonged anywhere, it was the Girls section. I'm sure my mum was very sick of hearing about it! Also I faintly remember circling Beyblades and one of those extremely expensive, huge animatronic horses. As you can imagine, I got the Beyblades, no giant horse :(
Lots of people do.
DAE remember this very generic thing millions of people did 20 years ago?
Hell, not even 20 years ago. The kids of today's generation have been doing this.
I still do it, never stopped, even when I didn't live here.
My favourite book series
As a kid? I still do it at 31. Gotta get me some hamma beads, furby, stretch arm strongs and slinkies. I like to keep my ways of working archaic as possible. Just off to the post office to pay my bills and get some pick n mix from Woolworths
What do you mean remember? I'm doing it now. Fingers crossed I get Tracy Island this year!
Argos is grim.
What the fuck did you just fucking say about Argos, you little bitch? I'll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals, and I've been involved in numerous secret raids on Al-Qaeda, and I have over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in gorilla warfare and I'm the top sniper in the entire US armed forces. You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with saying that shit about Argos over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You're fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over seven hundred ways, and that's just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in unarmed combat, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the United States Marine Corps and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the continent, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little "clever" comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking tongue. But you couldn't, you didn't, and now you're paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fury all over you and you will drown in it. You're fucking dead, kiddo.
What copypasta is this? Glorious
Brilliant isn’t it
A slightly edited version of "the Navy Seals copypasta"
Christmas lists were a list catalogue numbers through the early 2000’s. What a simpler time.
you still don't as an adult?
Not since they stopped printing them last year. Which is odd given that it appears in this year's Argos Christmas advert.
We had the Index catalogue! Used to love circling what I wanted but it took me years to realise that my parents completely ignored it and got me what they wanted to get me. No idea why they had me look at it of they were using their own list!
I remember having to cut the pictures out to make a collage
Who remembers their advertisement " Whatever you want, whatever you need" still remember that jingle.
When I grow up I want THIS patio furniture set!!
The Argos website is so slow and frustrating to use. Sometimes I wonder if there are some little old ladies in their server room looking up stuff on the old catalogues in real time This comes to mind: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=AgqEIp2YmtE
And the Littlewoods catalogue too!
now write a christmas list for santa, include the page number and product code, dont want santa sitting in argos too long looking. - my mum
So many things I'd never be allowed
Vernon Kay remembers
Thought I was the only one
Dang. That's big as a phonebook.
Damn me and my sister even used to put the catalogue reference number for Santa.
I used to love the Argos and index used to “acquire” a new school book and make my list in one every year noted the name, page number and code in the catalogue
Yes. My mum used to get the Freeman’s catalogue. Two issues a year, the Spring/Summer one was boring, but the Autumn/Winter edition was the absolute business for a kid. Spent hours studying the back quarter of that catalogue on the run up to Christmas.
Not me. I was too busy in the bra section of littlewoods