Circuit City coming back with new, smaller stores

DALLAS, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Plans are coming together to bring back Circuit City, the electronics supermarket that folded after bankruptcy in 2009.

Dallas will be the initial market for the new company, with 50 to 100 boutique stores -- not the big-box style it once had -- expected to open in 2016. Up to 200 locations are eventually planned, with the Dallas store opening in June.

Circuit City employed over 34,000 people and had over 600 stores when it went under, a casualty of a marketing war against Best Buy and the 2008 economic downturn. In its new incarnation, stores will be about one-ninth the size of the old ones and will be located in urban areas. About 40 people are involved in the start-up, mostly in Dallas. Several formerly worked for Radio Shack, another victim of the electronics business wars.

The new stores are expected to target millennials and will offer smartphones, tables, notebooks, 3D printers and do-it-yourself electronics kits, with touchscreen terminals for customers to access online selections of over 1 million products.