I'm starting to feel my age. I can remember the small Maplin shop at Burnt Oak, Edgware.
Back in those days you could pick up some useful (and "competitively priced") bits and pieces in there. But that would have been (in my case) 26 years ago.
Unfortunately, I never visited the original shop in Southend-on-Sea (where the name, from the Maplin Sands mudflats, came from); but I remember their magazine adverts.
The last time I went into a Maplin store would have been nine years ago in Doncaster. They had a flashy (big) place there ... full of over-priced stuff that I didn't want; but hardly anything of the things I actually needed (what we might call "service consumables").
Thinking about it, I may have called in at their place in Stevenage since then (but still a few years ago); nice for a browse around, but not much else.
Following the demise of Maplin, hopefully a new "back to basics" business will emerge. Or better still, a string of small local independents.
Meanwhile, any bets being placed on "who's next"? How about Halfords?