Staples Announces Acquisition of Office Depot - Paperclips and pencils everywhere rejoice - Polidicks

[QUOTE]FRAMINGHAM, Mass. & BOCA RATON, Fla.--([URL="http://www.businesswire.com/"]BUSINESS WIRE[/URL])--Staples, Inc. (Nasdaq: SPLS) and Office Depot, Inc. (Nasdaq: ODP) today announced that the companies have entered into a definitive agreement under which Staples will acquire all of the outstanding shares of Office Depot. Under the terms of the agreement, Office Depot shareholders will receive, for each Office Depot share, $7.25 in cash and 0.2188 of a share in Staples stock at closing. Based on Staples closing share price on February 2, 2015, the last trading day prior to initial media speculation around a possible transaction, the transaction values Office Depot at $11.00 per share. This represents a premium of 44 percent over the closing price of Office Depot shares as of February 2, 2015, and a premium of 65 percent over the 90-day average closing price of Office Depot shares as of February 2, 2015. The transaction values Office Depot at an equity value of $6.3 billion.[/QUOTE] [url]http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20150204005441/en/Staples-Announces-Acquisition-Office-Depot#.VNL9f2jF-43[/url] I work at Staples as a tech and I'm surprised. Hope it turns out well.

arn't they basically the same store at this point both sell the same exact office supplies.

I hope nobody loses their jobs and the transition goes smoothly.

I thought they already did this, or was that just in Canada?

Lol the staples I worked at had an office depot like 3 stores down, they were in the same strip mall. I wonder what this will mean for them.

[QUOTE=usaokay;47078338]Just like the eb Games and Gamestop merger.[/QUOTE] Wtf I literally thought those were the same thing forever and ever and that they just used the store names interchangeably, like Home Goods and Marshalls or w/e my life is a lie

Every day a new acquisition. Everything merges into one.

[QUOTE=spiritlol;47078365]Lol the staples I worked at had an office depot like 3 stores down, they were in the same strip mall. I wonder what this will mean for them.[/QUOTE] Same here, I have a Staples and an Office Depot in my city that are relatively close to one another with ironically the Staples being complete shit compared to the Office Depot.

Meanwhile in Canada, many stores are closing down.

[QUOTE=Saigon;47078295]I hope nobody loses their jobs and the transition goes smoothly.[/QUOTE] Too late, one of my friends already lost their job and was trying to get them to quit by only giving them 6 hours a week.

Qhen a company merges with competition it's never good it just means they can raise their prices and slack off on rnd. The only way capitalism works is if there is constant competition.

[QUOTE=BloodRayne;47079254]Qhen a company merges with competition it's never good it just means they can raise their prices and slack off on rnd. The only way capitalism works is if there is constant competition.[/QUOTE] Office Depot is about a tenth of the size and can't even make a profit. If they weren't bought out, they probably would have risked going under sometime in the near future. Also what kind of R&D is an office supply retail store going to be doing? Are there scientists in lab coats somewhere running tests to see how high they can price printer ink?

At the beginning of the year it was announced that alot of Staples stores were losing their part time team supervisor (a part time manager position), as well as other departmental supervisors. Combine that with the 25 hour a week cap on part time worker hours, and now this. All these hour cuts and layoffs are hurting stores operationally. Not sure how this is gonna pan out.

Yeah, we just lost our PTTS' and it sucks because now we have my epartment head (tech), and our GM and that's it for management. Our store is hurting even more and we've been cutting into our extra hours hard because now we can't do more shifts. A lot of us are considering quitting because of the management bullshit too.

Didn't know that Office Depot was still a thing, a couple of years back all of them around here got shut down.

That was easy.

There's an Office Depot in my hometown like a minute away from the Staples. One's gonna get closed, no question.

[QUOTE=deathmog;47080191]Yeah, we just lost our PTTS' and it sucks because now we have my epartment head (tech), and our GM and that's it for management. Our store is hurting even more and we've been cutting into our extra hours hard because now we can't do more shifts. A lot of us are considering quitting because of the management bullshit too.[/QUOTE] I just hope we acquire OD's warehouses. My store's distribution center is full of incompitent twats

Fuck, I should of got shares in staples since i still have my discount thing while i'm still working there.

So Office Depot buys out Office Max, who in turn gets bought out by Staples. Its odd I wonder if all the stores will be rebranded into Staples then. There's a Office Max/Depot working across the street from one another still running under their own names and its been like this for the past few months/year. Never did like Staples, they seemed slightly more expensive/less helpful then the latter.

[QUOTE=usaokay;47078376]When Gamestop bought out eb Games, the eb Games across the street from my Gamestop turned into a Gamestop. It was like that for five years or so until the old eb Games's location turned into a Yogurtland.[/QUOTE] There was an eb game's at my mall and a gamestop right outside the mall. They've both been gamestops since the acquisition, my guess is they keep both so if one store runs out of preorders the other will store have stock. [QUOTE=supersaiyenx;47081588]So Office Depot buys out Office Max, who in turn gets bought out by Staples. Its odd I wonder if all the stores will be rebranded into Staples then. There's a Office Max/Depot working across the street from one another still running under their own names and its been like this for the past few months/year. Never did like Staples, they seemed slightly more expensive/less helpful then the latter.[/QUOTE] God I remember my interview at Staples. They were gonna put me in the "EasyTech" section where I would sell phones and computers, because of my experience with them. However, they decided during the interview I was too honest, and put me in the Copy & Print section instead. :v: Gotta pledge those warranties to the uneducated because that's the big $$$

[QUOTE=spiritlol;47082051]There was an eb game's at my mall and a gamestop right outside the mall. They've both been gamestops since the acquisition, my guess is they keep both so if one store runs out of preorders the other will store have stock. God I remember my interview at Staples. They were gonna put me in the "EasyTech" section where I would sell phones and computers, because of my experience with them. However, they decided during the interview I was too honest, and put me in the Copy & Print section instead. :v: Gotta pledge those warranties to the uneducated because that's the big $$$[/QUOTE] Apparently my store is way better with customer service than the nearest store from us like 20 minutes away :v: All we do is approach customers and help them the best we can lol Also yeah selling warranties is huge in the tech department, I push Total Support every time I sell a computer. Although TBH people who get their work done at Staples for their computers are saving a ton of money anyway. I feel bad for you since you're in the Copy and Print department. We can't hang on to any associate that works there because they're never trained by management and thrown into the fire....the fire of [I]hardcore arts and crafts[/I]. Shit, I haven't even gotten formal training for my position in Tech even though I know the procedures after working there for almost two years. It pisses me off.

[QUOTE=spiritlol;47082051]There was an eb game's at my mall and a gamestop right outside the mall. They've both been gamestops since the acquisition, my guess is they keep both so if one store runs out of preorders the other will store have stock. God I remember my interview at Staples. They were gonna put me in the "EasyTech" section where I would sell phones and computers, because of my experience with them. However, they decided during the interview I was too honest, and put me in the Copy & Print section instead. :v: Gotta pledge those warranties to the uneducated because that's the big $$$[/QUOTE] Reminds me of when i went to apply for my job at staples and I put it in for tech associate. They put me in Aisles. :suicide:

[QUOTE=deathmog;47082863]Apparently my store is way better with customer service than the nearest store from us like 20 minutes away :v: All we do is approach customers and help them the best we can lol Also yeah selling warranties is huge in the tech department, I push Total Support every time I sell a computer. Although TBH people who get their work done at Staples for their computers are saving a ton of money anyway. I feel bad for you since you're in the Copy and Print department. We can't hang on to any associate that works there because they're never trained by management and thrown into the fire....the fire of [I]hardcore arts and crafts[/I]. Shit, I haven't even gotten formal training for my position in Tech even though I know the procedures after working there for almost two years. It pisses me off.[/QUOTE] Oh yea dude in Copy and Print I trained myself. I ended up finding solutions to problems that even my supervisor didn't know. I did have stellar customer reviews though, and the Copy and Print sections customer satisfaction rose 20% after I got there. The management loved me and told me after I quit for school that they'd take me back anytime. I don't think I will unless I absolutely have to though. My supervisor would get upset because I'd spend too much time helping customers, and if I have to explain what a pixel is to an old person one more time I'm going to snap. They don't understand it's not a physical unit of measurement. "How many pixels are in an inch?" kill me. [QUOTE=nomad1;47083802]Reminds me of when i went to apply for my job at staples and I put it in for tech associate. They put me in Aisles. :suicide:[/QUOTE] During back to school I had to work Aisles even though I was copy and print. I would basically radio in every question I got asked to someone else, get the location from them and wander around the store until I found it. I had to do this even though I had no training on aisles. :v:

[QUOTE=deathmog;47078289] I work at Staples as a tech and I'm surprised. Hope it turns out well.[/QUOTE] I work at Staples as tech too, how convenient!

[QUOTE=usaokay;47078376]When Gamestop bought out eb Games, the eb Games across the street from my Gamestop turned into a Gamestop. It was like that for five years or so until the old eb Games's location turned into a Yogurtland.[/QUOTE] We had a Gamestop open at Crossiron Mills, and after a year once people figured out the whole pre-order exclusives of Gamestop were not actually a thing in Canada, they got rebranded again as EBGames. [editline]7th February 2015[/editline] I still call it GameStop since it's easier on the tounge, less syllables then EBGames.

I worked for staples from 2011 to 2013. I was hired on as a tech, but I worked register for about 3 months, then sales for another 3-4 months. Then I got the "Senior Tech Advisor" position. Even when you're a tech who works on computers, you also have to do sales on the floor. I hated the job, but I did it well, and I got really good customer service ratings. Then I became the COT (Certified On-Site Technician). I started there at $8.50, and in a little over a year, I was at $11.69. When I quit, I said I'd never go back. Well in December 2014, I decided that working on my own wasn't enough, so I went back to staples (different location). Still there. I'm working sales again, back to the lowest pay possible. The good news is that Staples is starting a program in 40 of their stores across the country, where they will use something called Microsoft Match to "match" customers to their computers. A few of those 40 stores will have full-time employees "trained by microsoft" doing only that. My store is one of those, and my managers picked me over anyone else for the job. Later this month they're sending me to San Francisco for paid training. I don't know the hourly wage yet, but I'll also make bonuses if I meet sales goals. Shouldn't be hard considering the store I work in is insanely high-volume. I wonder what this purchase means for the rest of the Staples stores.

Downsizing, closures, and more bold product launches (Poppin, Cynthia Crowley designer office supplies, Martha Stewart brand os. Fuck all of that stuff, it never sells as well as home office wants it to).

Yuck, my store hasn't sold anything Martha Stewart branded in like a year. Or unless it goes on clearance for like 50 cents. I like the Poppin stuff but nobody buys that either, and the Cynthia Crowley stuff looks like shit mixed with barf.

We just got rid of our Martha Stewart office supplies and my supervisor as he tossed the backface into the recycling. "about damn time"