[1] In operation from 1983 to 2009, the chain began to decline in the late 1990s and 2000s due to the changing consumer electronics market.
[2] The company was established in 1983 by Michael McKenna and Daniel Behune, opening its first location in Vancouver, British Columbia.
[3] However, the franchise deal led to some friction: as McKay's franchised company had a stronger credit rating than the McKenna-Behune parent corporation, the chain was ordering all of its appliances through McKay, who tried to petition McKenna and Behune's company into receivership in 1987 over unpaid revenue compensation.
Under McKay's ownership, the chain served markets in Ontario, Manitoba and Alberta, with 20 locations at its peak.
[1] In that year, however, it signed a deal as the exclusive Canadian distributor of Magnavox products, which locked it into purchasing $25 million worth of inventory per year regardless of actual sales;[1] at the same time, its early forays into selling computer products were unsuccessful.