Uh-oh, we got Hammacher Schlemmer
15Are the guys who sold out Woot about to destroy another beloved brand?
Hammacher Schlemmer may be next victim of serial ecommerce bunglers
NEW YORK, NY - MARCH 18, 2026 - With breathtaking hubris, the disgraced Woot.com leaders who sold the company to Amazon emerged today to shamelessly announce that they’d somehow gotten their hands on the beloved catalog brand Hammacher Schlemmer.
Showing little awareness of how deep they’re in over their heads, the ex-Woot sellouts declared that the venerable 178-year-old retailer had fallen into the lap of their anonymously named shell company, Stores.com.
“Hey, look, I can’t believe it myself,” said Matt Rutledge, CEO of Stores.com and founder and ex-CEO of Woot, blinking in bewilderment at the vastness of the task before him. "You sell a few Bags o’ Crap, have a few laughs, next thing you know you’ve got the keys to one of the 20th century’s most fascinating retailers.
“Wow. I mean… just… wow…” Rutledge continued, staring into the middle distance, his voice trailing off.
Rutledge and much of the Woot founding team fled the mess they’d made at Amazon in 2012, stealthily regrouping to launch a near-identical “funny” daily deal store at Meh.com because they couldn’t think of anything else to do. That store remains in business as of this writing.
When asked how the old gang planned to avoid the fate that turned Woot into a hollow parody of its once-vital self, Rutledge paused a long time before answering. “Sell cool stuff, I guess,” he finally, tentatively replied. “Like, remember when Hammacher Schlemmer sold that one-person submarine for like a million dollars or whatever? That was cool.”
Myriad questions remain about how exactly the Stores.com operation will overcome its limitations to restore the past glories of the esteemed Hammacher Schlemmer, whose now-defunct Manhattan store was a landmark for decades in the greatest city in the world. Can it credibly take back the mantle of innovation from the likes of Kickstarter? Can it translate the appeal of the classic catalog into the digital age? Pressed for details, Rutledge changed the subject.
“The name Hammacher Schlemmer still means a lot to people,” said Rutledge. “At this point, that’s all we’ve got.”
Watch the tragedy unfold at hammacher.com, if you can stand it.
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/showme “Woot to Hammacher Schlemmer”
@f00l Here’s the image you requested for ““Woot to Hammacher Schlemmer””
Did the bot glitch writing the copy for the email?
@ybmuG you’d think in the age of ai they would have a proofreading ai. Especially knowing zoomers have the attention span of a tic tac.
@ybmuG looks that way, I saw the paragraph about selling cool stuff twice.
Isn’t Hammacher Schlemmer the store MST3K always made fun of?
I have to pee.
I’m there!
Why doesn’t my VMP code work? I need to spend $3000 on a bracelet.
Mens room attendant told me to remove my smart glasses, so I returned wearing these.
Now that you’ve purchased these new things, can we lower the meh shipping cost?
I came here to name drop Woot some more. If I could add a picture it would be Bald Elon hangin on the CRT that reads PayPal.
@user87647985 I’ll try it for you.
/showme Bald Elon hanging on the CRT that reads PayPal
@MrGoodGuy Here’s the image you requested for “Bald Elon hanging on the CRT that reads PayPal”
This repetition was totally on brand…
"When asked how the old gang planned to avoid the fate that turned Woot into a hollow parody of its once-vital self, Rutledge paused a long time before answering. “Sell cool stuff, I guess,” he finally, tentatively replied. “Like, remember when Hammacher Schlemmer sold that one-person submarine for like a million dollars or whatever? That was cool.”
When asked how the old gang planned to avoid the fate that turned Woot into a hollow parody of its once-vital self, Rutledge paused a long time before answering. “Sell cool stuff, I guess,” he finally, tentatively replied. “Like, remember when Hammacher Schlemmer sold that one-person submarine for like a million dollars or whatever? That was cool.”"
Open skies ahead!
@dkrupps I came here to paste this from my email, lol
@dkrupps @ekw I didn’t notice that.
@dkrupps @ekw I didn’t notice that.
I was ready to leave a serious comment. I have ordered from HS a few times - I think three times over the last 40 (yes forty) years. And for six months or so I have been considering an item there which I see is no longer there now. So I have a few thoughts about this which are not necessarily bad or snarky. And I was early in that W place and also here at Meh from the beginning. Also that A place.
@ojohn I have the giant inflatable Rudolph and Clarice Xmas lawn ornaments and was hoping to add another one or two this year so I’m also interested to see what’s going to be available through the H-S brand now.
@rogrtheshrubber Since meh is sometimes a closeout store, it would be very interesting to know where meh has closeouted the HS stuff they don’t want to carry going forward! If someplace has the thing I was considering, at half price now, I would get it.
So…the H-M website indicates that memberships are $8.99/mo. For those of us who signed up in the past via meh, should we expect that the historic monthly contribution stays the same, or is a membership increase in our future (and the new price is just for new suckers)?
Sorry, Daethnir, we did the Wikipedia edit within 3 minutes of each other!
I have no idea that Ham Maker Slammer is, but I look forward to Meh’s stewardship of another brand.
/showme a guy expelling a gigantic glob of phlegm and yelling “Hammacher Schlemmer” as he sneezes with snot flowing out of his nose.
@MrGoodGuy Here’s the image you requested for “a guy expelling a gigantic glob of phlegm and yelling Hammacher Schlemmer as he sneezes with snot…”
@mediocrebot Great job!
That should be the new logo for the site! 
one of the few times i’ll ever say, and mean, these brands really go together
This is incredible! I remember going to the Chicago location with my parents and seeing a tiny, street-legal car.
I’m in! Sell a tiny EV and I’ll buy it just to prove to Dad I’ve really made it!
50% off an Official Top Gun Bomber jacket? I’m totally in, as long as it has enough pockets for my phone chargers and CRKT knives.
@okham and Bluetooth speakers!
Awesome!
Now do ThinkGeek
VAN GOGH! MANGO! TANGO! AWESOME!
would have been awesome if Matt had waited to announce on April 1.
MEALS! DEALS! EELS! AWESOME!
I know this means “not much” but I still have my Woot! flying screaming monkey, and the little 20 year old F(censored)ers battery still has a charge. He will be going to college this fall, to get an Engineering degree in the field of elastostatics.
They grow up so fast…
@TheDagda I still have a big Woot! monkey on my bookshelf and far too much crap I haven’t let go of, yet.
@TheDagda @Thumperchick I got a woot monkey in a fuku early on. Who knows how that happened or how it landed after woot at meh. Mine was swiped by a then young grandkid (who is now almost 13) so who knows where it is now.
@TheDagda @Thumperchick I also still have a big Woot! monkey and it is sitting on a bookshelf in my home office.
So I looked at the The Collapsible Wagon Cart on there. Three sizes and no dimensions of the actual cart part of it so you know how big the “bag” part of the cart is, just how many pounds it holds. Totally useless if you want to fit specific things into the wagon part of it. And no place to ask as customer service apparently is only for items you have already bought.
Meh needs to go through their catalog and fix things like that and also have a place to ask questions like mine.
@Kidsandliz Let me see what I can do about those dimensions for The Collapsible Wagon Cart
@Kidsandliz - We’re updating it on the product page now, but here are the dimensions for you:
132lb- 30.6 inches (H) x 15.8 inches (W) x 26.8 inches (D)
220lb- 33.5 inches (H) x 19.9 inches (W) x 37.8 inches (D)
330lb- 37.8 inches (H) × 19.9 inches (W) × 40.2 inches (D)
@Thumperchick THANKS!!! I appreciate that meh is reading this thread and making changes.
So is stores.com in addition to or instead of Mediocre as the family brand?
@readnj Appears to be “instead of”.
@readnj Mediocre became Mercatalyst like 7 years ago or so, then Mercatalyst became Stores.com this past January.
@lljk I must have been asleep 7 years ago totally missed that middle step and still thought it was Mediocre!
@lljk @readnj We are, and I can’t stress this enough, still mediocre. We just stopped putting in the effort of capitalizing it.
@lljk @mschuette @readnj
So only putting in mediocre effort as you need to store effort in order to even have enough to still be meh?
Oh my god, what are you guys doing??? (Also, I think I like it…)
I don’t even know who you are anymore…
why was there two of the same paragraph in the second email? is this code for something??
@carl669 also, why were there two…? Glad I nevre maik ne mistaiks myself.
@mehvid1 their they’re. it’s ok to make mistakes. your still a good human.
@carl669 oof!
@carl669
It’s so motherfucking mediocre.
Esp re that fuck-job of proofreading.
@carl669 @f00l
As a mail carrier, I see their catalogs from time to time. A few years ago, the cover featured this weird device with three concentric rings, and I was curious what it was. So I found the item in the catalog, and it turned out to be a watch winder.
The price was over $10,000 for a device designed to do a task that almost any person could do with their own fingers for free.
@MntlWard That’s what HS was, with a few items like that for each catalog, but the other things were more reasonably useful things a little overpriced.
@MntlWard it’s even worse than you think. It doesn’t wind the kind of watches you wind with your fingers. It only winds the automatic watches that wind themselves.
Says the guy who has a Wolf winder (that he found at goodwill and waited until it was half price, and still feels like he overpaid).
@djslack Okay, that makes no sense. I had one of those watches, and it wound itself so tight it stopped working.
I keep reading the name as Hammacher Schlammacher
Private equity firms ruin everything.
You guys just straight up bought Hammacher Schlemmer? WTF
Also, I can’t believe this isn’t AI-generated
@pakopako Yeah, but it doesn’t have an 8-track or a mini-cassette player, so the AI was slumming.
@cfg83 @pakopako Or a reel-to-reel. Or DAT. Or DCC. Or Muntz Stereo-Pak.
@narfcake @pakopako Of course! How could I forget …
/showme Hammacher Schlemmer is selling All-in-one stereo that has phonograph and tape cassette player and micro cassette player and 8-track playuer and reel-to-reel tape deck and DAT and DCC and Muntz Stereo-Pak all in one case
@cfg83 Here’s the image you requested for “Hammacher Schlemmer is selling All-in-one stereo that has phonograph and tape cassette player and…”
@cfg83 @mediocrebot
I hope that comes inside a totally meh fake wood cabinet.
I hope it weighs a truly obnoxious # of pounds.
@cfg83 @mediocrebot Where’s Playtape?
@mediocrebot @ojohn
Aaugh …
@f00l @mediocrebot
With that nostalgic whiff of formaldehyde!
@cfg83 @mediocrebot
Exactly. That lovely poisonous smell of toxic fake wood.
/showme “poisonous fake wood cabinet”
@f00l Here’s the image you requested for ““poisonous fake wood cabinet””
@f00l @mediocrebot It’ll air out … in a few years.
@pakopako Sorry, but it if doesn’t support 8 Track tapes and Super Audio CD’s, I’m not interested.
@pakopako I have a stereo that plays cassettes and CDs. My parents have it to me right after the moment of temporary insanity where I tossed all my cassettes. I don’t know what I was thinking; some were just copies of albums, but a few were things like concerts that can’t be replaced. At least I never got around to getting rid of my records, although I don’t have a way to play them. Maybe I should get this stereo…
OMG, this is adorable …
… and I’m totally not gonna get it.
You know, in the last IRK I bought and forgot to post, I got a Hammacher Schlemmer shoulder heating thing. I turned to my mother and said, did Hammacher Schlemmer go out of business and someone buy their intellectual property and trademarks? Anyway, it’s a nice shoulder heating thing. I should go post it.
@mossygreen One of these?
@cfg83 Yep, the compression shoulder thingie.
@mossygreen Looks totally butch. You could probably use it in a Judge Dredd Halloween outfit.
Congratulations to Meh’s writer for writing the product listings for the whole dang catalog. Well done.
The catalog was based on long descriptions of unique products so I guess it’s a good fit!
“Save money by cutting copy editing costs on the email distributions, I guess.”
@jasonrtoon Your write up of the fake news release is too funny!
In the announcement email you copied and pasted a paragraph twice. So, yeah, things are off to a great start and there’s no concern this brand will face the same demise as WOOT. So, yeah, things are off to a great start and there’s no concern this brand will face the same demise as WOOT.
@matthewvoll Then we need to preserve the meh videos because woot deleted them.
@matthewvoll Woot’s not dead. It’s just a zombie. A really big Lovecraftian zombie.
Way back in the early days of e-commerce Neiman Marcus had that submarine too. But on their website it was listed at $0.00. I suppose to prevent someone from buying it.
I ordered one.
It didn’t show up.
I emailed them inquiring about my order.
They didn’t answer.
Me and Neiman Marcus are done.
@djslack This one is more expensive, but just look what you get!
@djslack
To truly get back at NM you should use the “stolen” chocolate chip cookie recipe and distribute those…
@djslack did they at least give you your money back?
@OnionSoup I never got a check!
I look at Hammacher Schlemmer and I see Meh Schlepper and some extra letters.
Above-midrange traditional game sets with interesting materials for the game tokens would be one item to look for. I don’t need to observe that HM was known for quirky, above-average, and new-idea stuff, all of it with good quality of materials and manufacture, but I’ve never let the lack of need stop me.
However, if some wag were to declare that HM needed a Rubber Chicken Corner for a weekly bizarre/silly item no one needs but some crazed types just might decide they must acquire, it just might work.
going to get mine, soon
You got a HAMMERED David SCHWIMMER??
/showme a totally drunk and staggering David Schwimmer frantically trying to find his friends and yelling “Rachel?”, “Joey?”, “Phoebe?”, “ANYONE??”
@MrGoodGuy Here’s the image you requested for “a totally drunk and staggering David Schwimmer frantically trying to find his friends and yelling…”
@mediocrebot PERFECTO Mr. Bot!!
@MrGoodGuy Commander Riker? Worf? ANYBODY!!! Lightning strike
Ah Hammacher. The terrestrial sky mall. They had the absolute best “lifetime” warranty for roomba vacuums, years later when they failed I could return it for store credit towards the latest model, all you had to do was keep a copy of the receipt and know where it was. I spared them the one robot that ran over cat poop and just ate the cost.
@DLPanther I remember Hammacher Schlemmer sometimes even had a section in the actual SkyMall catalog, at least as far back as 20 years ago.
This sentence from the introduction is crying out for an adverb. Give it your best shot, Mehtizens!
“That store ___________ remains in business as of this writing.”
I’m going with “surprisingly.”
@ItalianScallion I’ll offer up “fortuitously.”
@ItalianScallion How about “inexplicably”?
@werehatrack You got me laughing out loud with that one. Bravo!
Good way to start my day!