Musicland

[2][3] The company expanded rapidly during the mall boom of the 1980s and continued to grow into the nineties, enjoying a long tenure as the United States' largest specialty retailer of entertainment products.

During the same period, the company also developed a small market Media Play by opening On Cue stores across the country as well.

In 2001, The Musicland Group Inc. was purchased by Best Buy inc. as part of its initiative to diversify its retail holdings to reach a larger demographic with its consumer electronics and entertainment products.

They launched a major remerchandising campaign and converted Musicland's On Cue concept of rural stores to the Sam Goody brand,[4][5] reducing its position in books and moving more into video games and DVD.

As a result, they put the company up for sale and were likely just weeks away from liquidating the entire chain when they found a buyer in Sun Capital Partners of Boca Raton, Florida.

The now Sun Capital owned Musicland Group filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in January 2006, and in February announced the closing [1] of 226 Sam Goody and 115 Suncoast Motion Picture Company stores, and all Media Play locations.

In March 2006, Trans World Entertainment announced the purchase of Musicland's remaining 400 Sam Goody and Suncoast stores from Sun Capital, along with their websites.

[2] More than 100 Sam Goody stores remained in operation as of January 2007, but as a result of a disappointing fourth quarter and full year 2006 for Transworld Entertainment, chief executive Robert Higgins announced in their fourth quarter earnings conference call that many of those remaining Sam Goody stores would be facing closure.