Independent tv rental/sales/ repair shops. Who remembers them

[oldwheels]

My brother in law started his working life as a tv repairman and had a weekly jaunt from Glasgow to Kinlochleven in a mini van. I winter it was sometimes an adventurous journey. Once he had to stop on Rannoch Moor and got out of the van which began to slide off sideways back down the road with the combination of wind and ice on the road. He became adept at spotting freshly killed deer and shoved then into the back of the van sometimes if they were still warm.
One repair job in the valve days was to put the telly in the van and take it away to repair. After a run back to base it usually worked ok.

 

[Archie_tect]

When Mrs A_T and I got married in 1983 we bought our first colour TV from a company that sold off ex-Radio Rentals' TVs. It was a really cheap way of getting a reconditioned tele... worked for years until we moved and bought our first new one!

 

[classic33]

Fred Moore's, two shops and a seperate repair workshop. Only the repair workshop remains.

 

[Jenkins]

There's an East Anglian chain that still offers rental not just of TVs, but kitchen appliances and computers

https://www.hughesrental.co.uk/about-rental/

 

[gavroche]

I had my first rented colour tv from rediffusion back in 1975. in Worthing.

 

[Accy cyclist]

We were only talking about this subject up the park yesterday. We all had the opinion that televisions 'cost a bomb' in the 50's 60's and 70's so rental way the cheapest way,but now Quote...They're all cheap chuck away after a year or two crap now,so no one rents.

I wonder if they still have tv repairmen,sorry persons. They were like the 4th emergency service when your 'box' broke down!

 

[fossyant]

We had a little TV at home (i.e my parents house), and I know we had a 24" CRT in our current house as our first TV - it was MASSIVE compared to our parents. Then was the 28" Wide screen TV that was a mile deep and was the weight of a tank (don't ask me how I got it in the house).

Crazy. I go out to my office shed every day with a laptop and two 22" screens to plug in - no weight at all. A 50" TV is not heavy now.

 

[irw]

We were only talking about this subject up the park yesterday. We all had the opinion that televisions 'cost a bomb' in the 50's 60's and 70's so rental way the cheapest way,but now Quote...They're all cheap chuck away after a year or two crap now,so no one rents.

I wonder if they still have tv repairmen,sorry persons. They were like the 4th emergency service when your 'box' broke down!

I've had the same 32" LCD TV for about 12 years now*. Over those 12 years, I've replaced the input board inside it once, and a couple of years ago, the power supply board, which, by good fortune, I picked up via a mainstream well known auction site. Cost me about £800 when LCD TVs were still a 'new' thing, so I'm going to get my money's worth out of it!

*But for the past 4 years since we moved into this house, we've not had a working aerial, so for the purposes of not alienating the majority of posters on here, IDHATV.

 

[cookiemonster]

Plenty of them here in northern Hong Kong. Staffed mainly by guys in their 70s but they're still going.

 

[screenman]

Not only rented tv but also video recorder and a games machine, bloke next door worked for Radio Rentals and got us a very good deal. Fast forward to the nineties and I had a very nice business going with Radio Rentals polishing scratches out of tv sets, £35 a time and 20 a day was not unusual. I had Nottingham, Hull and Grimsby depots within easy driving distance, I sold the business before the bottom dropped out of it.

Our current 42inch was £700 10+years ago so just over £1.30 a week if it went pop today, funny enough we were talking about this last night as Tesco has a 58 inch set in for £299 on black Friday, we have decided to stay with what we have.