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Posted on 07/23/2004 3:04:39 PM PDT by Willie Green
Plagued by poor clothing sales, Sears, Roebuck and Co.'s second-quarter profits were about a third less than what Wall Street expected, and the nation's biggest department store chain warned of a bleaker outlook for the rest of the year.
It wasn't good news for Sears' employees, either.
Under pressure to prove it can perform as a pure retailer since last year's sale of its profitable credit business, Sears announced Thursday that about 3,300 jobs, or 1.6 percent of its U.S. workforce, are in the process of being eliminated this year. That includes layoffs of nearly 200 workers at its Hoffman Estates headquarters.
The difficulty in finding a silver lining in Sears' quarterly results prompted retail observers to question everything from the company's apparel strategy to the staying power of its management.
"At what stage of the game do you stop and say, `Is this a business we should keep investing in?'" said Credit Suisse First Boston analyst Michael Exstein.
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
Our local Sears store is totally mismanaged and hires the dumbest workers in the world. Their clothing is crap, and except for their tools, nothing else is worth a thing. And now that they bought Orchard Supply Hardware, I can get the Craftsman tools there. Although, they've already brought down the quality of the OSH employees. Sears deserves what it gets, IMHO.
They just bought Land's End and all its distribution networks here in WI
hope they dont start cutting back here....to...
Many plant closings the last two years and not much growth so far...
Only 3,000 jobs - is McDonald's hiring?
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Have you been to a Sears lately? How do these guys stay in business? There is nothing they sell that you can't find at a better price somewhere else. Twenty-Five years from now, and maybe sooner, nobody will even remember who they are.
It's not a lot, but given the choice among KMart, WalMart and Sears, I choose Sears.
So, that will drop the number of customer service employees in each to two. And, both of them will be at lunch or on break if I ever went into a Sears.
your first added link shows exactly why Sears is in trouble: they're buying stores form K-Mart. K-Mart's no good poorly run company that makes crappy decisions, if those stores were good places for department stores K-Mart wouldn't be wanting to get rid of them. Picking up K-Mart's dirty laundry is not a good way to build your business, there's a much better market in picking up K-Mart's disatisfied customers, which is what WalMart and Target have done quite effectively.
My sentiments exactly. The only thing keeping them going is the tools.
The Sears in Joplin closed its automotive shop about 2 years ago. They deserve to go away for their shoddy clothes, crummy displays and incompetent employees.
I can buy tires anywhere.
I can't remember the last time I went to Sears.
It's not just that their products bite. They will hound you to death if you buy an appliance, say a refrigerator or a tv, about their worthless service contracts.
They were the fore-runners of the "report them to the credit bureaus if they don't pay by 1:00am our time."
The clothes that the Sears HERE stocks are all aimed at Mexicans. Hate to sound crass, but they're just awful. Their dresses and blouses are loaded with lacy ruffles, glitter, sequins, etc. Just awful. I've been to Sears over in the Bay Area and they carry a totally different line of clothing. They just figure there are so many Mexicans here that they should cater to them.
This is just the beginning, look for much more house cleaning to follow.
I hope they don't cut back here also --- JC Penneys did and really I like something other than Walmart and all the Goodwill stores popping up to do my shopping.
I noticed (who couldn't?) when I lived in San Diego that they catered to the lower echelons. Gross smarmy sequined clothes for young and older.
The stuff was jammed in racks next to dirty dressing rooms and the mooks in the automotive department still took my brand new spare and tried to play off "best of the four" when I bought tires. I had an hour long fight with the manager wherein he finally produced my order for my new tires where I made the service writer put on "leave my spare alone."
It's unfortunate that a company with such longevity in America has to go down, but bad management is bad management. I just hope they don't destroy Orchard Supply. I would leave us with very little else. No Home Depot here in Socialist Santa Cruz. No Wallmart either.
Oh but wait. Better jobs will be coming any day now, at least that's what we've been told by our leaders. "Americans have an opportunity to seek their creative potential"...so we've been told. I guess we're just not very creative as the record bankruptcy and foreclosure rates show. It would be amusing if it wasn't so downright frightening.
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