Posted on 10/09/2018 8:28:12 PM PDT by yesthatjallen
Sears Holdings Corp. could file for bankruptcy as early as this week as the company assesses how to manage its more than $130 million in debt, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.
The news outlet reported that Sears has $134 million in debt due on Monday. While chairman Edward Lampert could make the payment, the company has hired M-III Partners, a boutique advisory firm, to put together a possible bankruptcy filing.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Lampert, whose hedgefund owns a majority of Sears' shares, is hoping to secure a restructuring of the company's debt, which would include the company divesting from its Kenmore appliance brand.
Sears has accrued more than $11 billion in losses since 2011, and The Journal reported that the company must raise more than $1 billion a year to stay in business.
The once prominent retailer has seen scores of its brick-and-mortar locations close in recent years as it faces growing financial losses. The Wall Street Journal reported that Sears still has nearly 900 stores in business.
The company acknowledged earlier this year that it was a victim of a hack that affected fewer than 100,000 of its customers. The hackers likely accessed credit card information belonging to customers who made online purchases at Sears and Kmart stores between late September and October of last year, the company said.
Wow. I remember Sears being the Number 1 place for families to shop. Every year we would pour over the Christmas Catalog. I remember the year there was a catalog that showed um....a bit of a male model modeling briefs along with a bit of his bits... a real SCANDAL that was at the time. Oh, my age is showing. LOL
They ignored the internet.
My home is a 1919 Sears Catalogue home. It was called “the Castleton” in the catalogue. Sears delivered the materials to a nearby railroad spur, and they had a local contractor dig a foundation to spec. I don’t know who put the kit together, but it is overall excellent quality. For being “mass production” the interior millwork is beautiful, especially compared to what one gets today. A magnificent combination of American labor, creativity and craftsmanship.
When you think about it, it was an extremely innovative concept for the time.
THEY NEED TO ANNOUNCE THAT THEY WILL BE SELLING A FULL LINE OF TRUMP PRODUCTS
Here on the edge of the Earth (Guam), we have very few options to buy consumer goods. The world’s largest K-mart is here and is always busy. Life here would be far less livable without it.
I will be sorry to see Sears/K-Mart go.
That always shocked me, given Sears was essentially the 19th Century Amazon. If anyone knew how to sell remotely (at one time) it was Sears, and yet their web site has always been terrible. Didn’t help any when Lampert merged them with the cancerous Kmart.
I recall the scandal you mention. Its times like this I feel old:)
I live in a part of the country where Americans do the jobs Americans no longer do, but on those rare occasions I go to my local sears I only hear Spanish and Arabic spoken.
They should have shut down all their stores and gone completely online. I miss the brick and mortar stores but that’s where this is going.
A sad end to a once great company. Many middle class families relied on Sears for everything but groceries: clothes, tools, paint, carpets, furniture, appliances, electronics, car service or parts, and even family photos!
Our outside shutters came from Sears-—and their Wish Book arrival before Christmas made my kids ecstatic.
‘.
Not only is the website bad, who’s idea was it to make Sears and Kmart look like a flea market?
The irony being that Sears founded the concept of Mail-Order, which could arguably be considered as 'the Internet of its day'
Additionally, Sears was also an early adopter of a consumer 'online service' with Prodigy.
Sad that the company got run over by those who recognized the potential of the Internet while not positioning itself to profit from the new technology.
~ MM ~
Yup, the sears catalog and the jcpenney catalogs were the internets of the day
I’ve never understood. Is Lampert just using Sears Holding Company as a tax writeoff? And why does Jim Cramer from “Mad Money” keep recommending it?
Actually, are you sure it was sears? I think I recall it to be a ‘James Cash Penney’ scandal.
Another American institution down the drain.
My family shopped a lot at Sears when I was growing up. My Mom worked there part time for several years.
Id you broke a Craftsman hand tool, even if using it for something it wasn’t designed to do, Sears would replace it, no questions asked. They are good tools, too. Still have a bunch.
I remember when Cramer was recommending Sears Holding when it was still quite high in price. He believed in the management, and said it could eventually reach the heights like Berkshire Hathaway. I am surprised that he would still recommend it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.