Sears Holdings files for Ch 11 closing 142 more stores before years end

[Puffnstuff]

Happy New Year retail workers as Sears Holdings announces the latest round of store closures. This time we have specific locations provided in this USA Today article so check and see if any are near you. Here in Jacksonville, FL Kmart has already left town but will Sears follow them?

Anyways bargain hunters get ready for going out of business markdown sales starting next week. MAGA for sure. Trump should take credit for producing the greatest going out of business sales this year. His slogan should be MRAER - Make Rich America Even Richer. Those unemployed workers have the best benefits and with no jobs they can go on vacation like I go to play golf.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/01/04/your-local-kmart-sears-closing/1005274001/

 

[BoomerD]

Both suck, so I don't really see a problem with it...other than the loss of jobs. Product quality (especially their house brands) has been getting worse and worse, to the point wbere I won't even consider Craftsman tools anymore.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

This country was bought and paid for long before Trump. Get your head out of your ass. Both sides are fucking us.

 

[Mai72]

I knew a girl who was working 4 hours a week at Kmart. I asked her wh she stayed, and she said that she liked the job. lol

 

[sandorski]

They've been clearing out Sears stores up here in the Great White North for a few months now. Only ever shopped at Sears at each XMas for a set of XMas clothes, so it's not a huge loss. Although, I used to order from their catalogue a lot back in the '80's.

Their failure is directly tied to the increase of Online purchasing. Which brings me to this point: How the fuck did Sears fail? They have been doing the whole Order/Ship thing forever, the Internet was perfectly designed to fit their whole shopping scheme. Somehow they (mis)managed to drop the ball.

 

[MomentsofSanity]

They've been clearing out Sears stores up here in the Great White North for a few months now. Only ever shopped at Sears at each XMas for a set of XMas clothes, so it's not a huge loss. Although, I used to order from their catalogue a lot back in the '80's.

Their failure is directly tied to the increase of Online purchasing. Which brings me to this point: How the fuck did Sears fail? They have been doing the whole Order/Ship thing forever, the Internet was perfectly designed to fit their whole shopping scheme. Somehow they (mis)managed to drop the ball.

Yeah that one baffles me. One Christmas I sat the kids down on my iPad with the online wish book and told them to go through and mark things they might want from Santa. Then that night just clicked checkout.

How they screwed their model so bad makes no sense.

 

[shortylickens]

Kmart died a LONG time ago, so this shouldnt be news. Some individual stores hung around, running themselves. But closing a few more is expected and understandable.

 

[Zorba]

The only real Sears left around here has looked like it was going out of business for at least three years, but it still hasn't made the cut. It really makes me wonder what the closing stores look like.

Both suck, so I don't really see a problem with it...other than the loss of jobs. Product quality (especially their house brands) has been getting worse and worse, to the point wbere I won't even consider Craftsman tools anymore.

This. I used to buy exclusively Craftsman tools. I had no problem paying more for the quality and for being built in the US. But they tools are just junk now. The last two wrenches I bought, one was so out of spec it rounded off the nut. The other one hadn't been deburred and actually cut my hand open the first time I used it (It cost like $30 too, got a Kobalt for $10, much higher quality). The worst thing is they didn't even lower the price when they sold out to China.

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

Yea, they're both dead, just don't know it yet. Neither are going to bounce back, their sales models are beyond outdated and it's far too late in the game for them to turn it around. Don't really care too much about kmart, never liked it, however, Sears was an icon of business in this country for more than a century. I can't think of any other store like them who had the widespread impact they had on peoples daily lives.
Buy a car, a house, some pants, tools, etc. Also my dad worked his entire adult life at Allstate which was owned by Sears, so I'm kinda biased.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Sears has been complacent, and slow to adopt effective omni channel retail practices.

They made a deal to sell Kenmore appliances on Amazon last year. It was evidently successful enough that they are expanding to include Diehard products. https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/14/sea...-with-amazon-to-sell-car-batteries-tires.html It may mean the Sears brand survives, but the B&M part will be next to, or completely, nonexistant. At least the way things are going for them. There is too much overlap with Walmart, Target, and other competitors that are eating their lunch.

 

[fskimospy]

I used to work at Sears when I was a teenager in the late 90's and it wasn't great then. If anything I'm kind of surprised they managed to hang on another 20 years.

 

[K1052]

B&M retail is going to undergo a spectacular implosion over the next five years or so, especially as a lot of debt for them and landlords comes due.

 

[woolfe9998]

This is just another example of the long, slow inexorable grind of technology killing jobs. Amazon is more efficient, centralized, less labor intensive than retail B&M stores. The weaker ones like Sears die out first.

In the future, we are going to have to adjust to lower levels of employment.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

Kmart and Sears, like Ward's and Hostess, screwed their companies from the top down. CEO's and CFO's pocketing huge payouts while they destroy the business a chunk at a time. Why does no one call them on it? Because, the actions they take can be defended by following best financial advice regarding stock prices which is guaranteed to make you go broke slowly. Ever heard the saying, "You can't manage by the bottom line?"

 

[pauldun170]

Sears has been complacent, and slow to adopt effective omni channel retail practices.

They made a deal to sell Kenmore appliances on Amazon last year. It was evidently successful enough that they are expanding to include Diehard products. https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/14/sea...-with-amazon-to-sell-car-batteries-tires.html It may mean the Sears brand survives, but the B&M part will be next to, or completely, nonexistant. At least the way things are going for them. There is too much overlap with Walmart, Target, and other competitors that are eating their lunch.

Kenmores are basically appliances made by Whirlpool\LG\and a couple of manufacturers but with sears service contracts.
People will say Kenmores are crap noaways and that you should buy brand x instead without knowing that the Kenmore and Brand X use the same components inside.
The same stuff is till going to be built in the same factories by the same people.

Die hard is the same thing.

I think that the brand names still have value. Sears can drop off the face of the earth but Kenmore and Diehard might be worth keeping around. Both are pretty established and trusted brand names.

 

[Puffnstuff]

I think that the brand names still have value. Sears can drop off the face of the earth but Kenmore and Diehard might be worth keeping around. Both are pretty established and trusted brand names.

They'd both be bought up during a liquidation for fire sale prices.

 

[brycejones]

Kmart and Sears, like Ward's and Hostess, screwed their companies from the top down. CEO's and CFO's pocketing huge payouts while they destroy the business a chunk at a time. Why does no one call them on it? Because, the actions they take can be defended by following best financial advice regarding stock prices which is guaranteed to make you go broke slowly. Ever heard the saying, "You can't manage by the bottom line?"

This so much this. Sears is just being sucked dry by a hedge fund running CEO who really only wants the real-estate. He is slowly siphoning off anything of value while saddling the company with more and more debt. Its basically self dealing at this point.

 

[brycejones]

They'd both be bought up during a liquidation for fire sale prices.

The will be sold long before it gets to that point just like Craftsman was.

 

[Puffnstuff]

The will be sold long before it gets to that point just like Craftsman was.

They'd be valuable to a big box store like Home Depot who's building in house branding.

 

[pcgeek11]

This has absolutely nothing to do with Trump.

Sears was going down the drain for a decade or more already. Then Kmart bought them back in 2004 and accelerated the process.

 

[Puffnstuff]

This has absolutely nothing to do with Trump.

But that's the irony as R's will blame D's when this happens on their watch.

 

[OutHouse]

MAGA for sure. Trump should take credit for producing the greatest going out of business sales this year. His slogan should be MRAER - Make Rich America Even Richer. Those unemployed workers have the best benefits and with no jobs they can go on vacation like I go to play golf.

IDIOT.... WTF DOES TRUMP HAVE DO WITH SEARS/KMART CLOSING? DID YOU BITCH ABOUT OBAMA WHEN SEARS/KMART CLOSED 109 STORES IN 2014?

 

[OutHouse]

But that's the irony as R's will blame D's when this happens on their watch.

SO DID YOU BLAME THE DEMS IN 2014?

 

[K1052]

This has absolutely nothing to do with Trump.

Sears was going down the drain for a decade or more already. Then Kmart bought them back in 2004 and accelerated the process.

Not wrong however I do wonder about the impact of this on perceptions of Trump in rural/small town places he won by promising an economic resurgence. Losing the rest of your retail except for dollar stores (which are rapidly growing) will have some sort of result on people's opinions. Also a lot of people work at those stores and in many cases retail employment makes up a big share of the jobs to be had.

Trump saying stock market is up, unemployment down so he took care of everything while your slice of America circles farther down the drain might not fly forever.

 

[pcgeek11]

But that's the irony as R's will blame D's when this happens on their watch.

I haven't seen any of that blaming the Dems on their watch. Sears was going down since pre-2000 which lead to Kmarts purchase of Sears.