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Sears sells Craftsman brand to Stanley Black & Decker for about $900 million
Chicago Tribune. ^ | Jan. 5, 2017 | Lauren Zumbach

Posted on 01/05/2017 8:00:47 AM PST by Leaning Right

Sears Holdings will sell its Craftsman tool brand to Stanley Black & Decker for about $900 million, the companies announced Thursday.

The deal will provide another cash infusion for Sears, but it comes at a cost — broadening distribution of the well-known brand gives consumers one less reason to choose to shop at the struggling Hoffman Estates-based retailer.

(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy
KEYWORDS: craftsman; sears
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To: mountn man

You just need a new set of work gloves that have L/R interchangeable stamped on them. :0)


41 posted on 01/05/2017 8:22:40 AM PST by Gaffer
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To: Leaning Right
The death knell of Sears is also a symptom of the death of Middle Class America. Sears always WAS the consummate Middle Class department store. It offered high quality goods to the factory worker and mid level management families for over a hundred years. The slow death of Sears over the past thirty plus years tracks directly with the flattening of wages and the loss of middle class incomes and large middle class families.
42 posted on 01/05/2017 8:22:51 AM PST by Jim from C-Town (The government is rarely benevolent, often malevolent and never benign!)
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To: Drew68

Husky or Kobalt are far superior now to Craftsman tools. Back in the 70’s Craftsman was THE tool brand to own. Now it’s just Chinese die cast junk.


43 posted on 01/05/2017 8:23:02 AM PST by miliantnutcase
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To: Leaning Right
Gee... +1 on the "This is the end of Sears" counter.

Craftsman hand tools were once a quality brand, with a lifetime guarantee.

Somewhere along the way Sears started calling EVERYTHING "Craftsman", like cheap lawn equipment that came with NO guarantee, in contrast to Craftsman hand tools that came with a lifetime warranty.

Also in the last few years they've been selling "OTC" (Other Than Craftsman) hand tools, which are junk. I bought a set of Sears non-Craftsman ratchet wrenches about a year ago and two of them didn't live thru the first use, they literally just fell apart. I didn't even bother to go ax for my money back, I just threw them in the trash and said I'd never go back to Sears.

Also manufacturing got moved out of the US. I've seen posts here where someone who seemed to know said that the company that HAD been making Craftsman tools for Sears is now making another brand of tools for another well-known outlet. I forget the particulars.

Anyway, yes, it's the end of Sears. They may as well sell off the Kenmore brand too now and just shut 'er down. At this point they'd be missed about like... like... what was the name of that book store... started with a B...

So who wants to own a really cool skyscraper in downtown Chicago?

44 posted on 01/05/2017 8:23:22 AM PST by OKSooner (www.greatagain.gov <= Go here to put a note in the suggestion box!)
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To: CodeToad
That ends Sears. Not kidding. That and Kenmore are their two primary brands. One gone, the other struggling.

Yep. They should focus on those two brands and let other inventory go. Ultimately it is an image problem IMO that Sears is struggling with. If Sears can't find a way to get young people into their store they are screwed.

45 posted on 01/05/2017 8:23:47 AM PST by plain talk
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To: Jim from C-Town

They had the same problem Kodak, IBM and other behemoths of the fifties and sixties had. They’d been so successful for so long that they just could not envision that ever changing, and thus didn’t see the need to change until the rug had already been pulled out from under them. And, not only that, but the entrenched bureaucracy built up over the decades was so calcified that it couldn’t do anything differently even after the belated recognition that they were in trouble. You can spot the lumbering, consensus executive group-think decisions littering the past, possibly the “right” thing to have done in a muddled way, a decade too late.


46 posted on 01/05/2017 8:23:55 AM PST by RegulatorCountry
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To: Leaning Right

That’s the end of Sears.


47 posted on 01/05/2017 8:23:58 AM PST by Ray76 (DRAIN THE SWAMP)
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To: bert

The Bristol mall, IIRC is on the “dead mall” liist.

CC


48 posted on 01/05/2017 8:24:38 AM PST by Celtic Conservative (CC: purveyor of cryptic, snarky posts since December, 2000..)
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To: CedarDave

“If all these brands are crap, are any quality brands left? And if so, their names please.”

I have found that Milwaukee power tools are a cut above the rest. And they have been very innovative in bringing out their newest line of battery-powered tools. As for hand tools, Husky (Home Depot) is made by the company that used to make Craftsman (before Sears moved that brand to China). And of course, if you are a professional and can afford them, the Snap-On brand of hand tools is tops.


49 posted on 01/05/2017 8:24:49 AM PST by vette6387
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To: Red Badger

“A friend of mine was thrown off a ladder, about 8 feet when he was chain sawing a tree limb in his yard and it kicked back. Had to have some braces put in his neck....................”

Reminds me of two friends hunting snakes at night with a gun and cigars on a boat in their small lake (maybe beer too).

Sometimes combining items seem to be begging for an emergency room visit.


50 posted on 01/05/2017 8:26:18 AM PST by alternatives? (Why have an army if there are no borders?)
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To: vette6387
"As for hand tools, Husky (Home Depot) is made by the company that used to make Craftsman (before Sears moved that brand to China). And of course, if you are a professional and can afford them, the Snap-On brand of hand tools is tops. "

Thanks, that's the info I was looking for.

51 posted on 01/05/2017 8:28:38 AM PST by OKSooner (www.greatagain.gov <= Go here to put a note in the suggestion box!)
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To: CedarDave; jaydubya2

If Klein Tools makes it, it’s probably the best. Of course, $50 pliers ought to be the best!


52 posted on 01/05/2017 8:29:18 AM PST by jjotto ("Ya could look it up!")
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To: miliantnutcase
Now it’s just Chinese die cast junk.

It seems to depend on what you buy. I have bought some Craftsman hand tools in the last ten years, and all were stamped "Made in USA". On the other hand, it seems like all of the Craftsman workbenches are made in China.
53 posted on 01/05/2017 8:29:21 AM PST by Army Air Corps (Four Fried Chickens and a Coke)
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To: Leaning Right

Goodbye, Sears, and good riddance.


54 posted on 01/05/2017 8:31:26 AM PST by LibWhacker
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To: Jim Noble
Jim, Your explanation is spot on. ( post #37 )

For that reason alone it will never make it into the MSM level of reporting.

Hopefully Trump's reign will change some of these things permanently.

55 posted on 01/05/2017 8:31:59 AM PST by VideoDoctor
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To: IronJack
Sears should have sold off everything BUT Craftsman.

Suppose Sears had done this instead. Make Craftsman (and Kenmore) top-of-the-line brands, of the highest quality. No cheap parts. No shortcuts. Only the best.

And offer free 15-year warranties on everything...on tools, on washing machines, on microwaves, etc.

Of course that would make everything more expensive, maybe by 25%. Would that work? I think so. Not every consumer is looking for cheap junk.

56 posted on 01/05/2017 8:32:22 AM PST by Leaning Right (I have already previewed or do not wish to preview this composition.)
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To: Leaning Right

Black & Decker makes Dewalt. They sell the hell out of them.


57 posted on 01/05/2017 8:33:49 AM PST by caver (Obama: Home of the Whopper)
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To: vette6387
...the Snap-On brand of hand tools is tops.

Amen! Especially if you are working on just about anything with an engine.
58 posted on 01/05/2017 8:34:18 AM PST by Army Air Corps (Four Fried Chickens and a Coke)
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To: Leaning Right

The market never make sense. The Market Makers know they can sucker people into buying small shares and cover their winnings.

Fact is, Sears hasn’t had anything but AA executives for more than 10 years and they have wound down the company.

Koddak, Jeppesen, Sears, et al., have failed to make the digital transformation required.

I worked with Sears Wishbook years back in the 1990’s when they were told of the Amazon model long before Amazon was even created. They walked away from it. Walked away. They had idiots that wanted “a customer service experience” instead of “get money, deliver product”.


59 posted on 01/05/2017 8:35:45 AM PST by CodeToad (If it weren't for physics and law enforcement, I'd be unstoppable!)
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To: mountn man
"I’ve never understood the fact that companies make right angle drills, but NOT ONE makes a left angle drill."

That reminds me of the one where a home improvement contractor whose ancestors came from a certain eastern European country had hired an apprentice.

He started the kid off nailing siding to a house. After awhile, he noticed the kid throwing some of the nails down to the ground.

"What the hell are you doing, throwing those nails away?"

"Uh, sir, those ones had the head on the wrong end".

"Well duh, kid! You use those ones on the other side of the house!"

60 posted on 01/05/2017 8:36:02 AM PST by SnuffaBolshevik
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