Posted on 10/09/2018 7:18:17 PM PDT by rdl6989
Sears Holdings Corp. SHLD -5.99% has hired M-III Partners LLC to prepare a bankruptcy filing that could come as soon as this week, according to people familiar with the situation, as the cash-strapped company that once dominated American retailing faces a debt payment deadline.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
I have my father’s Craftsman tool box from the 1970’s. Durable.
Lowes purchased Craftsman tools in October 2017 where they are popular.
Sears. Could have been Amazon, since Sears had practice for a hundred years mail order items.
I believe that was around the same time as “Garanimals” and a line of sneakers called “Winners” ... all from Sears.
It's unbelievable how you can take a name brand which was iconic in America, and that had several sub-brands with high value (e.g. Craftsman, Kenmore, Allstate), and an incredible distribution network, and fritter that away into financial ruin.
Oh, I don’t know. They could be using a Sears do-it-yourself personal bankruptcy kit from one of their old catalogs.
I do remember Giranimals,not the other ones.
Happy times-—and a kinder world.
.
We’re no. 1!!
Things haven’t actually gotten that bad under him.
I’m not gonna lie to please the masses.
For some odd reason he has kept pretty tough police commissioners in office.
He backed down on moving the Columbus statue when we Italians let him know that would be BAD.
Could have been worse.
Was MUCH worse under Dinkins
Hmm.
Well you don’t know my age or my parents’ age so the 50s is a good estimate.
but i was born by my mother later in her life.
She was born in 1933.
So that conversation maybe happened in, I’d guess,in the 1920s.
And i have NO IDEA when gun control mania broke out in this country so I can’t put any of it in perspective.
But what you’re saying is even 70 years ago, in a time when I thought it would have been much easier to have a gun, many people still didn’t.
I believe it. especially in certain states.
It has been a right that has been underutilized to say the least
No they couldn't have been Amazon. The problem is that they had that hundred years of history telling that whaat couldn't be done.
Think about another corporate clash from a few decades earlier. There was a time that if you wanted to ship something UPS was the go-to choice. A few days for local delivery, and a week or more for cross-country. And they "knew" it couldn't possibly be done any faster. Then this upstart company called Federal Express started delivering letters and small packages overnight. And they really did it -- on a schedule UPS "knew" couldn't be done.
UPS survived that one, by adapting to the new technology and learning new, leaner ways. But think how profitable they would be right now if FedEx had never arisen.
Sears had mail order and catalog all sewed up, but it was slow and clunky. One catalog was good for a year and they were so expensive to print that the merchandise changed slowly if at all. And delivery times were so long that it was worth driving 50 miles to pick something up.
Enter Amazon with an on-line catalog which changes every minute and which the customer pays the cost of printing. (Amazon still has to edit and publish it, but the customer provides the readout device.)
And two-day delivery is normal and customary. When we start running out of some household staple, it is cheaper and easier to just order it right now from Amazon while we are thinking of it than it is to put it on a grocery list. All of a sudden delivery is faster than local pickup. Sears never knew that could be done. In fact, they knew it couldn't be done.
I am sort of holding my breath on just what Amazon its going to do with Whole Foods. I don't have any inside info, but I bet Safeway won't like it.
My ACE hardware store has a wall full of Craftsman tools.
I remember being a kid in the 60’s hating going to Sears with my Dad. He would need a tool and he could never find anyone who knew what they were doing.
I remember that every time I’ve walked into a Sears for the past 50 years or so.
For the last ten years, the only time I would go into a Sears is when I would go through it to the get to the movies.
Yes. The advance of digital marketing was a huge game changer.
By the time Sears tried to make the jump it was a classic case of too little, too late.
They had already lost the high ground and their customer base.
If/when 3-D print-on-demand technology becomes viable & affordable it could be a game changer of the same magnitude.
This is just bad management. The ossified management style has doomed the company.
Sears is the only place that sells Levis in all sizes.
Too little, too late.
Geat point. If your company’s executives have “business” degrees in their background, run away.
Just like when your kid’s school teachers have education degrees. Your kids are learning from dumbbells.
Or like Apple corp beling handed over to a gay guy because he is gay. That was Apple’s downfall.
Trump you notice has a finance and military background. It makes for a great President instead of a Poly Sci know nothing.
The degree type, matters.
As a child my dad dug a Craftsman wrench out of the dirt in a vacant lot.
Sears gladly traded it in for a new one. Nowadays I wouldn’t even want one.
When I lived in San Mateo, CA the Sears was a standalone building next to the mall and had a full automotive service department with maybe 20 service bays.
That was all torn down years ago. Now it’s a Barnes & Noble and Macaroni Grill.
That would be Railway Express Agency
While dying, REA moved from the railroad terminal to a place next door to me. One day a guy came to me and asked if I could takeover the final delivery of his freight. The customers actually came by to pick up their items. A note on the door directed them to my office.
I did and became the REA agent but actually did next to nothing because there were few actual items. As I recall, the freight was mostly fruit trees. I filed a claim weekly and was promptly paid.
Included in the deal was a green REA delivery van thaat was in working order.
Things just ended. No more deliveries, no more contact, no one ever came for the van. It was just over.
As I recount this tale, I can’t really believe the truth..... I was aan REA agent
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