Posted on 12/04/2014 12:38:36 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Sears is shutting down hundreds of stores.
The chain announced today that it is accelerating store closings to 235 this year, 100 more than previously planned.
Sears' total net loss for the quarter was $296 million.
Sears' and K-Mart's collapse is "inevitable" and could happen by the year 2016, retail analyst and author Robin Lewis writes on his blog.
"These two retail brands are dead men walking," Lewis writes.
"As a retailer they're at the point of no return," David Tawil, cofounder of Maglan Capital and an expert in distressed retail companies, told Business Insider earlier this year. "The real question now is when does it all end?"
The company, which has currently has 800 namesake stores and 1,100 Kmart stores, has lost $6 billion since 2012. Suppliers are growing concerned that they won't receive payments for merchandise.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
I stopped shopping there when they stopped selling parts maybe 5-6 years ago.
” I overheard sales guys fretting that not only might we not get paid outstanding debt, but that going in to bankruptcy they can bill us for whatever they paid in the previous 90 days.”
True if they extended credit to Sears because it’s called a preference—the bankrupt has paid one creditor but not another. So it’s a way to make all creditors get the same percentage of the money owed to them. If it’s cash on delivery, it’s not a preference.
“I don’t know how Harbor Freight makes it...but the one near me is still in business.”
If you sell a tool that would be good for life at, say $3, and one pile of garbage tool good for use twice @ $1, your average consumer will buy the pile of garbage over and over again.
Garbage electronics is another category where people, for whatever stupid reason, will buy the same pile of garbage over-and-over again instead of spending more on something that will last significantly longer for a few dollars more (TVs are a prime example of this).
You could slap a $99 price tag on a piece of crap 40” TV during the holidays that hasn’t a prayer of lasting more than a year or two. It will sell out. People will kill each other over that pile of crap.
The surviving idiots will be lining up for the same piece of garbage and violence the following holidays once their TV dies during the summer.
It’s the cycle of stupidity! If you have no morals, you can cash in on it too!!! :-)
I’m surprised it lasted this long.
And Kenmore
Sears catalog wiped many an arose in outhouse days
Which BTW....my great granny had in Frogtown Mississippi til she died in 1964
Once great stores. I remember as a kid our parents took us with them through the Sears&Roebuck shopping experience. I can smell the popcorn now at the concession stand. A box of popcorn and a bag of chocolate malted milk balls to share with the sibs.! Heaven on earth to this kid. Leaving with a new pair of shoes, or a jacket...it was all good.
All of us marked the items we wanted for Christmas in the Wish Book.
A piece of Americana gone or going...
There is a Sears outlet store in Boise that pretty much does exactly that. The tools they sell are are CCJ (Cheap Chinese Junk), though. If that's what I'm looking for, I'll go to Harbor Freight.
And the "ladies foundation garments" pages were the last to go. ;)
*************
cough..cough KLEIN
They won’t need the batteries when they shut down the auto centers...
Good post.
I have SnapOn and Craftsman stuff that’s 40 yrs old and still working well, but I have HF stuff that works pretty good too.
I’ll never forget page 602. 1975 I think..
I have to walk through a Sears store now and then. Really depressing. Empty with cranky employees standing around complaining.
And all women had big pointy bra cans
And were skinnier....
Maybe so. On the other hand Diehard, Craftsman, Kenmore, etc are well known, established brand names that could be sold off and start getting distributed through other channels.
Where I am the loss or the Diehard brand would not be catastrophic. Our factory has been full up all year with or without Sears and operations would probably be happy not to have the extra set of inventory to keep track of. The biggest concern as I understand it is the loss on product we have already made.
I think I envied the kid that actually got the full blown slot car track in the wish book.
Good idea.
Do you know where the majority of Craftsman tools are now made? Also, please explain what happened to the former lifetime warrantee on Craftsman tools.
Sears is now reaping the seeds that they sowed. Good riddance.
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