Sears has been on the ropes a number of times, and even the their recent alliance with K-Mart was a desperation move, that only delayed for a while what is the inevitable end and liquidation of an American institution.
Before there was a K-Mart, before there was a Wal-Mart, there was Sears, all things to all people. Mail-order was the means by which they built name recognition and popular appeal, and only later did the brick-and-mortar stores come along. Their catalogues were the source of a great deal of sex education for the young males of America, and even contributed to early-day recycling, substituting for tissue in the country outhouses that dotted the country side and eve most small villages in the early part of the 20th Century. One of the big nostalgia items in recent years were the reprints of early Sears, Roebuck & Company catalogues, and comparing some of the prices with what a similar item today. You could even order the complete bill of materials, all pre-cut and identified, to build a house on your foundation, the old “Sears Craftsman” designs, and for a while, in the early 1950’s, a car cloned from the Kaiser Henry J model, called the Allstate.
Wal-Mart is the 900-pound gorilla in the room today, WAY bigger than any grocery chain, or any hardware line, or any soft-goods store in the US, and even in the wider world market. Target is a far-distant second place.
At one time, Sears’ major competitor was Montgomery Wards, does anyone still remember that name? They competed on much the same turf, but they declined and went away a long time ago.