End of an Era as Last South African Music Shop Closes
End of an Era as Last South African Music Shops Set to Close
South Africa's Clicks Group has announced the imminent closure of its Musica stores—the last music stores in South Africa after 29 years.
South Africans are bidding farewell to Musica, yet another cultural giant which will be closing shop soon. Musica stores, which are owned by the South African Clicks Group, have been the leading music retailer in the sales of physical CDs and DVDs for close to three decades. Musica admittedly provided a home for many South Africans to leisurely browse through their favourite music in very much the same way book lovers do in book stores. However, as a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and having been outcompeted by the digital music world, all Musica stores across the country will be closing permanently.
READ: South Africans Say Goodbye to Beloved 'Cosmo SA' Magazine
In a statement issued by the Clicks Group, the company writes:
"Musica has been operating in a declining market for several years owing to the structural shift globally to the digital consumption of music, movies and games from the traditional physical format.The inevitable demise of the brand has been accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic which resulted in the rapid decline in foot traffic in destination malls where Musica stores are typically located."
The closure of Musica is not surprising given the considerable impact that the digital era has had on traditional industries such as print media, video rentals and even photographs or images. The demise of previously lucrative enterprises such as Cosmopolitan SA, Blockbuster, Kodak and several others has been testament to this shift towards the digital with failure to adequately adapt proving detrimental.
Naturally, there are widespread concerns of further unemployment in South Africa given the closure of Musica during a pandemic. However, the Clicks Group has reportedly stated that employees will be absorbed into the group's expanding health and beauty stores "where this is operationally feasible."
The closure of all Musica stores is reportedly set to take full effect by May 31st of this year.
Here's what some South Africans on social media have had to say about the news:
Musica really could have been South Africa’s hot topic but they’re lazy https://t.co/jmZA3M78i6— 🍓🧸ʙᴇ Emotional Trashcan ⁷ᴳ BLM 🏳️🌈💜 (@🍓🧸ʙᴇ Emotional Trashcan ⁷ᴳ BLM 🏳️🌈💜) 1608227201.0
End of another franchise. Musica, formerly one of South Africa’s most established music and entertainment retail ch… https://t.co/Zr5wpAUNQw— 🚀 𝔽𝕒𝕚𝕫𝕖𝕝 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕝 (@🚀 𝔽𝕒𝕚𝕫𝕖𝕝 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕝) 1611832750.0
Musica is closing like Blockbuster spectacularly folded a few years ago because the people running it could not ant… https://t.co/1XarKmtiN4— Vusumuzi Makubalo (@Vusumuzi Makubalo) 1611827485.0
Musica should have just become a music streaming service if they were really innovative.— Boipelo (@Boipelo) 1611823048.0
and kept a few stores around the country to turn it into a vintage boutique - selling vinyls and CDs cause there’s… https://t.co/rvnI4jM7Rs— Lelo (@Lelo) 1611835341.0
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