Another company wiped out by those damn kids downloading and streaming music on the internet. Honestly, I didn’t even think that these guys were still around, way to show some true resiliency Columbia House.
I do remember receiving the famed Columbia House Mailer “Get 8CDs for only $1” or something. The mailer included full color stamps detailing all the greatest artists of the time, stuff like “Weird Al’s Bad Hair day, Collective Soul, Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch, Fugees, MC Hammer (How’s he doing anyway?), Coolio – Gangsta’s Paradise” – Yes it was that good. Once you select your favorite CDs you stick these stamps on the sheet and mail it off COD. I’m almost certain that it was postage paid as well. Deal.
This all seemed a bit unbelievable like some sort of awesome “GIFT” being sent down from the Columbia House Gods. But with every deal from God there is bound to be at least one catch.
And of course there was a ton of fine print, something like the modern day EULA and of course I didn’t read it. I also didn’t have the cash to purchase the required 10-12 other CDs throughout the year, C’mon guys, I was only 12. So to keep this short “Thanks Mom” and Thank-You Columbia house for my first real lesson in “too good to be true” and of course “caveat emptor“.
Long live accessible Music. RIP Columbia House.
The mail-order music company that once tantalized countless broke teenagers by offering popular CDs for pocket change no longer exists.
Filmed Entertainment Inc., the parent company of Columbia House, on Monday filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and is seeking to sell off the last vestiges of what was once a billion-dollar business.