Sunrise Records Canada - New Stores opening thread.

The Kelowna store isn't open but there is a row of brand new wooden racks sitting there that look like they were built to house vinyl records . . .

 

Two more openings

Lime Ridge Mall - Hamilton, ON
McAllister Place - Saint John, NB

 

Surprised this is going slower than first thought and they are opening new east coast stores first. West Canada has basically been without a place to buy new release CDs in person for 6 months - when HMV got their accounts shut down.

 

Just been to the St Laurent Mall and they are putting out the stock in the old HMV there, so I suspect it will be open soon.

 

West Edmonton Mall location looks to be preparing for opening. They had lots of stock there - vinyl/cd's on the bottom floor and movies on the top floor. The old HMV sign is still up, however.

 

I've passed by the Orleans location a few times in the past 10 days. They have the same set up but with Sunrise signage on the walls. Needless to say, there's an "opening soon" sign outside.
I recognized several of the staff members who were inside. I'm assuming they're retaining the staff that worked there before.

 

I was in Coquitlam Centre Mall (BC) about three weeks ago and walked past the already closed and cleared out HMV location near The Bay. There was no activity there. Yesterday I was in a different branch of the mall near Sears and there was the Sunrise location. They stayed in the same mall but not the same location. Looking in the windows it looked about a third stocked. Vinyl bins up front, maybe CD racks in the back (the store was dark). There were some vinyl box sets near the registers (?) and I think I saw both the complete stereo and mono Beatles boxes. They're pretty big so they stand out.

 

Anyone planning to check out the Sunrise in Fairview Mall (North York), don't waste your time. As of yesterday, they are not opened yet..., despite what the mall website indicates.

 

thanks for the update, saves me a trip

 

I just checked out the Sunrise at Fairview Mall, they are now opened.

Layout is very similar to the previous HMV, almost exact actually.

CD selection was better than HMV, but still not great. Back catalogue was a bit better. The sales person did say that they are expecting a lot more stock in the coming weeks. Prices were okay (average $12), no 2 for $15, etc deals like HMV used to have.

Vinyl selection was very impressive, but my goodness, the prices were outrageous! Average $30 per record. Hardly anything less than $30. Brutal. Not sure if they are pricing higher than other retailers, or perhaps this is just the going rate for new records in Toronto. Either way, I'm sticking to cds!

All in all, I found it a bit better than the previous HMV. Will definately check back in a month or two to see how the cd stock is looking.

 

Quite impressed with the selection of vinyl. Lots of rare(r) jazz titles that you'd have been hard pressed to ever find at an HMV (outside of maybe the Toronto superstore). Picked up a few John and Alice Coltrane albums for $21 each.

 

Coquitlam store (BC) open yesterday. Not listed on website yet so others may be open as well.

 

I'll be in Tsawwassen Mills tomorrow, will check to see if they're open

 

Quite a few stores appeared to have opened in the last few weeks, including the Rideau Centre in Ottawa which opened I believe in the last few days. may try and check it out over the weekend.

 

A few more just opened in BC. Has anyone been there?

 

They opened on Friday.
Same location as the HMV.
More music, less video, less junk

The rock/pop CD section is at least double the size of the previous store. And not just the obvious stuff, decent amount of catalog titles.

Not sure about the prices, maybe a bit on the expensive side.

Overall a big improvement and I'm thrilled they're open.

 

Was in the St Laurent store last night, must have opened on Monday or Tuesday as it was shut on Sunday.

Reasonable selection of lp's and cd's but nothing I would say was a surprise ie. they had all the Beatles, Floyd, Zep ect. albums, reggae section had all the Bob Marley albums but not much else. Prices were around $30-$35 for a single lp, but some were more expensive ($50 for LA Woman!) Doubles were quite expensive too $50 for The Cures Disintegration, $50+ for the Peter Gabriel 45rpm versions.

A lot of cd's, far more than HMV had at the same location, but each shelve was probably only 50% full and not packed together, I didn't really have time to go through them to see how much of a deep catalogue they were carrying. Not too many box sets, the St Pepper Deluxe was (I think) about $210

Far less DVD's and Blu-Rays than HMV, and virtually none of the memorabilia tat that HMV carried either.

Fairly promising, but if I'm being honest I'm likely to still buy most of my new lps at Vertigo or The Record Centre as I normally do, still its a good place to escape too when the wife drags me out to the Mall!

 

I visited my local shop in Orleans. They opened on Wednesday. Yay!

Plenty of vinyl. They said they have more coming soon. Generally the same staff as before which is good.

 

Went into the St Laurent store this morning looking for the Bowie Cracked Actor cd, they didn't have it in stock, was told "Oh we only have 2 or 3 new releases", hopefully that's not a sign of things to come.

Ordered it off Amazon instead!

 

I checked out the Sunrise in Fairview Mall. Like @bluenote said above, it's really like walking into the previous HMV. They didn't do much to change the colour or design. I had a feeling of deja vu, for sure.

The vinyl selection was impressive. The CD selection was just okay. They have a habit of not putting a slot for each artist so someone like Belinda Carlisle might end up under an artist with the last name beginning "C-A".

It was also a Saturday and, well, compared to the rest of the mall, it was dead. It's not a good omen when the busiest day of the week and you literally have less than ten customers. I hope it improves.

 

is there a sunrise records in windsor?

 

Sunrise is now announcing they will be opening a store at The Avalon Mall in St. John's, Newfoundland. There was an HMV in the mall before they closed up when the others did. Not sure if it will be in that location.

 

I was there this eve and I felt I was in the saddest store in the world. Every store in the mall was busy and Sunrise was utterly empty and dead quiet. Not even music playing. Just rename it Sunset.

 

100% agree. I was in there last Monday just to see if things had picked up. It was worse. Yes, it was a Monday but Fairview can still get busy on a Monday evening.

It really is sad. It's also really dark in there (as it was in HMV). So many items and nobody touching them. I don't understand Sunrise's business plan. They learned nothing from HMV aside from expanding their vinyl section. But I still saw an endless sea of DVDs and Blu-rays. Granted, they had a decent selection of Blu-rays under $5 (The Verdict, The King of Comedy, Fargo) but I doubt they will make it to Christmas 2018 at this rate.

 

Sunrise has less debt/overhead and maybe a bit less stock overhead. Cheaper staff?