[budj]

The cause is simple: BAD MANAGEMENT.

Sears did not compete with online marketing - Walmart did, and they are doing well.

Sears had Craftsman tools and Kenmore appliances; standards for quality and cost.

[chrisser]

The cause is simple: BAD MANAGEMENT.

IMHO, you are exactly right. Sears made the kinds of mistakes that only a group of MBAs could make.

They could have been Amazon, and they had decades where they could still have turned it around and beaten Amazon. Even now, they have most of the infrastructure in place and have the one thing Amazon lacks - nationwide retail presence.

Instead they destroyed one of the greatest companies in history.

It's sort of a testament to the original company that it took so long for the incompetence to run it completely into the ground. It's been something like a 40 year slide into oblivion with red flags and consumer complaints lining the path.