Sears Canada is finished

They had a consulting group a few years ago tell them to do a Christmas catalogue to help sales. They decided against it even though there was plenty of proof that it would work. They spent the money failing anyway. A bunch of old folks in charge way too long.

US stores will be done the first of the year.

Sears had their chance but instead of changing with the times they remained stagnant and let The Bay (HBC, Hudson's Bay Company) revive itself in the early 2000's. I can still remember when The Bay was almost going under and it was an awful store. Now it's one of the better stores and it's still a department store, didn't change much but it did take on designer brands and quality goods, while Sears kept with strange off brands passing off as designer.

Last thing I bought from Sears was a book shelf, and it was only because they were the only place to be still carrying that specific type to go with my other one I bought years ago at Canadian tire.

Won't be missed, but it will leave malls with a huge amount of vacant space. wonder if anything else will move into them,

People like my mom and dad thought Sears would be around forever. Whatever you needed, they had it. If it wasn't at the store, you could find it in the catalog. Craftsman Tools were considered the best and they had a lifetime guarantee. If one broke, just take it back and get a new one, even if the thing was ten years old!

Just as Walmart came along and put so many mom and pop stores out of business, I wonder how long before Amazon puts Walmart out of business. That's another discussion though.

Online didn't kill Sears. It was dying a slow death even before the internet took off.

A lot of these retail chains didn't see changing consumer tastes and more specialized retail stores.

Sears never really adjusted their product mix selling everything from appliances and tools to clothes. Second, their positioning at the lower end of the market didn't help. There really was no compelling reason to go to Sears anymore. If I want cheap clothes, I got to Gap or Old Navy. If I want tools I go to Home Depot or Ace. If I want a TV, I go to Best Buy. If I want luxury goods, I damn sure don't go to Sears.

Sears was mediocre at everything, but not really good at anything. About the only people I see at my neighborhood Sears are illegal immigrants. It is so bad, all the signage in the store is in Spanish.

I've not been in a Sears for maybe 12 years. I went in to get a new TV for Christmas, the price was too high and I walked to a small local retail store down the street and saved a few hundred dollars. Not to mention the local store was an authorized repair shop for the TV. Sadly that local shop is now gone due to the Internet.

Sears for decades held it's ground by giving Sears credit cards to young people with no credit history's and then overcharging them for products they could buy anywhere else for less. Then we had those years where anyone could suddenly get a credit card and I think that played a role in this. No reason to have or use a Sears card and pay too much.

It's a sad thing. In my Fathers time if they wanted anything they ordered from the Sears Catalogue. When I was young Sears was still the place to go and the catalogue was still a valuable thing, in particular if you were in a rural area. The large Sears were always shoulder to shoulder customers.

It's like an important part of history dying off. I still remember as a kid looking at the first console color TV / VCR combo offered in the Sears store before anyone else had any kind of VCR. All of our tools were from there, all of our appliances were from there and driving two towns over to Sears was always an occasion.

originally posted by: Blaine91555
I've not been in a Sears for maybe 12 years. I went in to get a new TV for Christmas, the price was too high and I walked to a small local retail store down the street and saved a few hundred dollars. Not to mention the local store was an authorized repair shop for the TV. Sadly that local shop is now gone due to the Internet.

Sears for decades held it's ground by giving Sears credit cards to young people with no credit history's and then overcharging them for products they could buy anywhere else for less. Then we had those years where anyone could suddenly get a credit card and I think that played a role in this. No reason to have or use a Sears card and pay too much.

It's a sad thing. In my Fathers time if they wanted anything they ordered from the Sears Catalogue. When I was young Sears was still the place to go and the catalogue was still a valuable thing, in particular if you were in a rural area. The large Sears were always shoulder to shoulder customers.

It's like an important part of history dying off. I still remember as a kid looking at the first console color TV / VCR combo offered in the Sears store before anyone else had any kind of VCR. All of our tools were from there, all of our appliances were from there and driving two towns over to Sears was always an occasion.

I remember when I was a kid, my grandmother would always have those big thick Sears catalogues. It was fascinating flipping through them. I used to love the sections with BB guns and Go Karts.

I have, like most people, wondeful memories of Sears. The catalogue during christmas circling everything i wanted santa to bring me, to shopping sprees with my grandma. I still shop at Sears to buy my appliances, just out of being brainwashed by my grandparents that you buy them there. I will be sad when they go for sure, but my local one is still hanging on. Poor Sears....

Can't help but feel a little sad/nostalgic...km almost 50 now and as a kid growing up in a rural mountain town the Sears outpost was the only way to get the new fangled toys you see on tv! Couldn't wait for the Xmas Catalog to window shop all the cool toys....got a little bit older and i discovered women in under wear and spent large amounts of time shopping in the bathroom.....

So long Sears

One store I was shocked to see open was a new music store.
They closed down the HMV at the mall due to the lack of people buying cd's anymore. And opened a Sunrise Records.
I walked by there the other day - not a soul in the place asides the guy behind the register...just how i remember HMV was the last time I walked by there.

I think Sears has suffered from poor management ever since L-------- took over. He's chopping Sears up and selling them piece by piece. Merged them with KMart, of all things. If you do some reading into Sears and their issues, you'll see that they didn't have quite so many problems before this fella took over. He has no respect for the institution that Sears used to be, and has helped to make them no longer an institution quite soundly during his steering of the company that he owns a majority share of.

Some of the articles I read gave some pretty scathing portrayals of the guy. Makes Mr. Burns look nice, to hear it told. Never comes into the office, lights his staff up with epic rants on their inefficiency and ineffectiveness after he trips them up in their reports, all via video conference, of course.

Sears sells quality products, or used to, and they had a working model. The Sears & Roebuck mail order service was a game changer when it began, greatly reducing the cost of living for the average American. I think Sears could have weathered the changing times just fine had they focused on their core principles of quality products combined with excellent service. Keep your mail order thing up, maintain your appliance and tool lines, and build a decent website.

Of course, you get this hedge fund manager guy in, he throws all of Sears's assets in a bag with KMart and the rest of his marbles, starts selling it off piece by piece...before you know it, you've got a different company altogether. It's sad to watch, anyhow. Will they recover? I dunno.

a reply to: TheBadCabbie

I read an article that when the sears roebuck catalog first came like 100 years ago you could order a HOUSE they shipped all the parts and you erected it on your land!!!

they have these SEARS outlets as well where they send all the dented and scratched stuff and all kinds of things at a discount..I bought a clothes dryer at the outlet...a ton of problems...don't call the regular SEARS they know nothing and have NOTHING to do with SEARS outlet like it is 2 separate entities

check out this site sears archives with the houses and the prices www.searsarchives.com...

oh my other beef with the sears outlet...you look for a specific thing it comes up with different prices so you check where and it is is the boonies 100 miles away.....and none in MY area or if there is the cost is a ton more!!

This is the end of the world, We better go get five boxes of laundry detergent in case they shut down here.

a reply to: research100

Yes, there were houses and still are in many rural towns that came from their kits. This site has information on them.

Looking through I see many that are exact matches to homes in the area I grew up in.

a reply to: AndyFromMichigan

Sears and Kmart had to compete against Walmart and Amazon. Today more then ever, stores are offering 15%, 20%, and even 30% coupons to get traffic into their stores. If these brick and mortar stores don't find ways to offer more value to it's customers, unfortunately they'll go the same way as Sears and Kmart.

It's much easier to shop online and compare prices than it is to drive from store to store to compare prices. If I can get an item cheaper on-line with or without shipping, it's a done deal. Food, shoes and some clothing are the only things I need to try on or see in a store. If the retail stores are cheaper than online prices, than they'll get my business.

Competing for your business, it's the American way.

my ex mother in law gre up in piikesville kentucky and only had an outhouse. no indoor bathroom. she said they used to keep the sears catalogue in their to wipe their ass

originally posted by: The Great Day
Can't help but feel a little sad/nostalgic...km almost 50 now and as a kid growing up in a rural mountain town the Sears outpost was the only way to get the new fangled toys you see on tv! Couldn't wait for the Xmas Catalog to window shop all the cool toys....got a little bit older and i discovered women in under wear and spent large amounts of time shopping in the bathroom.....

So long Sears

The Christmas catalog was a HUGE part of my childhood for several years.

I can't remember the last time I was in a sears store, probably decades. but the last time I was in a kmart I left promising myself that I'd never go back!! I decided to go there because they had something I wanted on sale, at least that's what their sales ad said. but, well, guess it wasn't when I got to the register.. by that time, I just wanted to get out of the place. I had to ask three different people where something was and after wandering around and still not finding it, well, I decided I didn't want it that bad! So I get to the cash register and there's one person ahead of me. there's a girl announcing a blue light special and totally screwing it up. the cashier who was checking out the lady in front of me is too busy laughing and talking to another coworker about the lady screwing up the announcement to finish up for the lady ahead of me.. all the while my feet, legs and back are screaming at me because I had walked in the store for far too long.

I can't say anything about the sears, but if the other kmart stores are like that one, they deserve to die!!!

originally posted by: neo96
Online killed brick and mortar stores.

Shame too.

I still like being able to walk into a store and look before buying.

Sad but true. I used to like going to a mall around Christmas time. That being said, I've done all my holiday shopping online for like the past ten years. When going to buy clothes, I'll go to Kohl's and try on a brand for size I intend to buy online. For almost anything else I'll go to Target and check it out before buying online. I buy it online like on eBay because I can usually get it at least 25% cheaper with free delivery.

originally posted by: Jefferton
I haven't seen anyone under 70 go in or out of the Sears in my area for a long time. I think it is a long time coming, and no big loss.

Except, of course, if you're screwed out of your pension!

originally posted by: dawnstar
I can't remember the last time I was in a sears store, probably decades. but the last time I was in a kmart I left promising myself that I'd never go back!! I decided to go there because they had something I wanted on sale, at least that's what their sales ad said. but, well, guess it wasn't when I got to the register.. by that time, I just wanted to get out of the place. I had to ask three different people where something was and after wandering around and still not finding it, well, I decided I didn't want it that bad! So I get to the cash register and there's one person ahead of me. there's a girl announcing a blue light special and totally screwing it up. the cashier who was checking out the lady in front of me is too busy laughing and talking to another coworker about the lady screwing up the announcement to finish up for the lady ahead of me.. all the while my feet, legs and back are screaming at me because I had walked in the store for far too long.

I can't say anything about the sears, but if the other kmart stores are like that one, they deserve to die!!!

Before it closed, the K-Mart in my area made WalMart look like Neiman Marcus.