Comment: c.1966 HMV opened its first self-service department (where the discs were now in the sleeves in the browser bins) and bought a shop in the Edgware Road to be run on the same principle. Our in-house prototype, by the main entrance on the ground floor, was of immediate benefit to a trader who had a record stall just off Cambridge Circus at the junction of Charing Cross Road and Shaftesbury Avenue. He’d come in, select an armful of albums of his choice, and then sprint off with them along Oxford Street. Our security guard, an elderly ex-war sergeant with a gammy leg, was thwarted every time. I believe the arrangements were eventually tightened up.
Comment: c.1966 HMV opened its first self-service department (where the discs were now in the sleeves in the browser bins) and bought a shop in the Edgware Road to be run on the same principle. Our in-house prototype, by the main entrance on the ground floor, was of immediate benefit to a trader who had a record stall just off Cambridge Circus at the junction of Charing Cross Road and Shaftesbury Avenue. He’d come in, select an armful of albums of his choice, and then sprint off with them along Oxford Street. Our security guard, an elderly ex-war sergeant with a gammy leg, was thwarted every time. I believe the arrangements were eventually tightened up.