Here is an interesting take:
my mom (age 74) has been a loyal Penney’s shopper for the last 20 years. She has really enjoyed getting their coupons in the mail (and now the internet), receiving candy bars w/coupons, all their “sales”, clearances, etc. For her it was quite an adventure. She would spend hours in there digging around. In the last few years she had been able to save up gift certificates ($5, $10, etc) they gave out as rewards and redeem them for a single big purchase. She did this for a sofa. All in all she was indeed getting a very good value for the money she spent on purchases - plus the entertainment value.
But she took no notice of the gay thing, even after all us men in her family told her repeatedly about it. The adventure of couponing and apparent big savings trumped the culture. But when they discontinued the sales/coupons about the same time then she noticed. And started going to a regional department store called Belks. She still goes to Penney’s but its not the same. I was there with her this week and the store had very little merchandise on the floor, the walls had been painted bright colors and it was airy and open - and spooky. Not at all like a Penney’s. And there were no customers. For our family Penney’s had been the place my mother would go for home furnishings, draperies, linens, bath room items, and clothing - pretty much everything. But not anymore.
In the end, she has lost her fascination with Penney’s. If they do bring the sales and coupons back perhaps that will change. But in the end, for her at least, the gay thing was not an issue. Interestingly enough, it was for all the men in the family. So maybe it is true that women, in general, are more liberal than men. Or perhaps it is some natural inclination of men to be protectors of the family.
Yep, it is interesting. For me, it was likely more the money, than the gay thing. But both of them factored into my decision - as in, "Man, I don't approve of their sales tactics, so I don't want to shop there. And the pricing stinks now, too, so why bother?"
I figure that JCP couldn't continue to sell stuff at a loss....for instance a couple of years ago, I replaced all of the pillows in our house with high end ones (Sealy? They weren't the cheapies, at any rate) from JCP.
After the sale, coupons, discounts AND a doorbuster special, I think it worked out to $3-4 a pillow - about 10c on the dollar. Sez me, they can't be making money at that rate. So, they likely needed to rein things in a little.
However, there's an enormous difference between, "Let's make sure that we're not undercharging", and "Let's turn things upside down completely." Will they survive? I doubt it...but then there's always plenty of turnover in retail (see Circuit City, Linens and Things, Ames', Zayre's, Woolworth's, etc etc etc). The disappearing middle class will just hasten the shakeout.