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Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

nytimes.com

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Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#71

Post by chuckadams »

bfrog wrote: post #70
rainsford wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm even struggling to come up with counter examples where a major established company is able to successfully pivot when the business model that brought them success is no long as viable as it once was. Maybe IBM counts in that they still exist, although I'd argue they aren't nearly the omnipresent force they were back in the day. You could also count widely diversified companies, but I probably wouldn't because the…

Intel famously pivoted from memory. Maybe it’ll still get to where Pat wanted it to go as a foundry in its most recent pivot attempt, unclear yet.

It helped that they pivoted into a brand new and rapidly growing market that they had a big hand in creating. That's not so much the case for retail.

Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#72

Post by chuckadams »

razakel wrote: post #51
kotaKat wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fun memory and a bit of an internal photo (and a rare shot of PalmOS software from the inside): https://ibb.co/nsVrW0h1 Sears' jewelry was... definitely marked up. This is from a SNC (SEARS Network Communicator, just a fancy term for their Symbol PDTs) showing true cost on a "$1299" necklace. $1299 down to $324? What a steal! It still only cost Sears a hundred bucks.

All jewelry is ridiculously marked up. You see Cash for Gold places, but have you ever seen Cash for Diamonds?

That had a lot to do with De Beers blacklisting any buyers of used diamonds, so used stones would end up their only supply. Meanwhile running "Diamonds are Forever" campaigns that would paint any such recycling as the actions of sleazy dishonest pawn brokers. You wouldn't sell Grandma's precious heirloom to one of those people now, would you? Nowadays I'm not sure the cartels have the power they used to, but whatever's left does still seem pretty disproportionate.

Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#73

Post by chuckadams »

silisili wrote: post #6
wkat4242 wrote: post #4

What did they sell? A bit of everything?

Literally almost everything, up to and including entire houses. I've lived in two Sears houses, great quality stuff if not a bit small by modern tastes. When I was a kid it was normal for parents to let their kids read the huge yearly Sears catalog to get ideas or pick gifts. By then they'd stopped selling items like firearms and houses but had pretty much everything else. If they had the foresight, they should have…

One of Sears' house brands was Acme, and one of the items sold under that brand was anvils.

Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#75

Post by dragonwriter »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #10

At one point Sears owned an ISP, a bank, and a nationwide stock tracking and distribution system. They were Amazon before Amazon, but just didn’t realize it.

> They were Amazon before Amazon, but just didn’t realize it.

They did realize it (well, they obviously didn’t have Amazon as a reference, but...). And they enjoyed it for a long time. But, as has happened many times to firms very successful in one set of conditions, they failed to adapt to changing conditions.

Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#76

Post by dragonwriter »

craftkiller wrote: post #55
lazystar wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel like a big part of the downfall was the huge lumbering corporate culture unable to cope with JIT supply lines and race to the bottom economies of consumer goods. i think its simpler than that. they got so big that they didnt pay any attention to all the waste, e.g. all the ad time that they spent on the old "I'll call today" A/C commercial.

That ad was worth every penny. I _still_ quote that ad, and everyone over the age of 30 always recognizes it, yet I can't remember ads I saw last month. If only sears was still around to capitalize on the ubiquitous headspace they purchased.

> That ad was worth every penny. I _still_ quote that ad, and everyone over the age of 30 always recognizes it, yet I can't remember ads I saw last month. If only sears was still around to capitalize on the ubiquitous headspace they purchased.

Sounds like they would have been better off investing more in staying around in the conditions that actually existed rather than buying attention that they could never benefit from.

Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#77

Post by dragonwriter »

shit_game wrote: post #29
jbs789 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The internet was a paradigm shift… full of unknowns. I think you are underestimating those challenges. We only speak about Amazon now because it was the one that survived.

pets.com also failed to make it through the "carcinization" of online retail, but wasnt nearly as notable a failure because it was attempting to start an online retail business from the ground up, versus Sears' failure to adopt online retail to their already-successful B&M model. I think the Sears mode of failure is much more spectacular because it had previously thrived on a business model that's almost analgous to…

> Sears' failure to adopt online retail to their already-successful B&M model.

By the time of the height of the dotcom boom, Sears main income was from its consumer credit business, not its B&M retail business, where its dominance had been fading for a couple of decades.

Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#78

Post by potato3732842 »

b112 wrote: post #31
tkgally wrote: post #5

The Internet Archive has scans of Sears catalogs from when it was a major mail-order retailer. For example: 1911: https://archive.org/details/sears-roebuck-catalog-122-spring... 1922: https://archive.org/details/SearsRoebuckAndCoCatalog1922_201... When I was young, they were especially known for their tools: 1974/1975: https://archive.org/details/SearsCraftsmanPowerAndHandTools1... More here: https://archive.org/sear…

My house, built in the 60s, is actually 4 Sears cabin kits. The guy bought them, and assembled them end to end, making a long house. Same guy dug the original ditch by driving back and forth with his jeep for an hour during spring rain. This gives a perspective on his can do attitude. But really, I'm living in the house still, so it can't be that bad.

You literally can't do that today in any jurisdiction with building code. It wouldn't be illegal, but the hoops you'd need to jump through (and they way they'd likely try and screw you at every turn) to string together a bunch of kit buildings and call it a "house" would make it so expensive that you'd be better off hiring professionals to build a house the normal way.

Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#79

Post by compsciphd »

dragonwriter wrote: post #75
LeoPanthera wrote: post #10

At one point Sears owned an ISP, a bank, and a nationwide stock tracking and distribution system. They were Amazon before Amazon, but just didn’t realize it.

> They were Amazon before Amazon, but just didn’t realize it. They did realize it (well, they obviously didn’t have Amazon as a reference, but...). And they enjoyed it for a long time. But, as has happened many times to firms very successful in one set of conditions, they failed to adapt to changing conditions.

except arguably they should have it in their DNA to adapt. How does the company built on mail order not adapt to the new mail order reality.

Re: Only 5 Sears stores remain in the U.S.

#80

Post by stevenwoo »

expedition32 wrote: post #57
mulmen wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they did realize it and tried as hard as they could and still failed. I was a Sears salesperson in 2003 and 2004. The whole operation took itself very seriously and embraced the internet and technology. They just… failed. I’d love to know how they missed because everything was in their favor.

Simple, the internet shifted power to the consumer and the Chinese. Consumer: I can check prices at different stores in 1 minute Chinese: why do business with the Sears agent in Hong Kong when I can sell directly to the West? Rule numbero uno: there is no customer loyalty in Ba Sing Se!

Not just the internet for the Chinese portion. First the USA made this happen in living memory of many of us when they supported bringing China into world trade without trying to buffer the effects, nicely summarized here: https://www.npr.org/2025/12/29/nx-s1-5660865/why-economists-...

Consumer goods got cheaper at the cost a few million decently paying jobs and manufacturing capacity directly and due to second order effects.

Maybe in alternate history we could have saved some of this onshore manufacturing capacity but we’ll never know now.

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