Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: K Frame on September 17, 2021, 07:17:27 AM
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Sears is closing its last store in Illinois, where the company was founded and thrived for a century...
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/16/sears-is-shutting-its-last-store-in-illinois-its-home-state.html
How may Sears are actually left, you might wonder?
As of yesterday, 25, and 7 of those will be closing soon.
https://www.howmanysearsstores.com/#:~:text=Current%20Sears%20Locations%20-%20Last%20Updated%3A%20Friday%2C%20May,%20%20909-646-8000%20%2024%20more%20rows%20
No Sears remain open in Virginia. All of the Sears that I shopped at when I lived in Pennsylvania have closed.
What a sad state of affairs.
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There is (or was) a little Sears in Ontario,OR. It's been a month since the last time I recall seeing it there. I will need to look the next time I'm in the area. Pretty run down building and no bigger than your average small town Dollar Store.
I still remember as a kid, going to a three story (with escalators!) Sears with my parents and them letting me wander the toy, sports, and tool sections on my own. It was almost like going on a family outing, like the department store in A Christmas Story. What a difference 50 years makes.
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"What a difference 50 years makes."
Boy you're not kidding.
I grew up in the 1970s and 1980s (graduated high school in 1983), and Sears was the anchor store at the two major malls in the Harrisburg, PA, area. And they were HUGE stores. I think one of them was a 3 decker, as well, but the one I went to the most was a 2 decker, IIRC.
And christ, the malls themselves. It was impossible to move in them on a Friday or Saturday they were so mobbed.
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And christ, the malls themselves. It was impossible to move in them on a Friday or Saturday they were so mobbed.
And from Black Friday through 24DEC it was practically like a giant sardine can. My parents would have to circle circle the parking lot forever, waiting for a spot to open up.
Progress and Amazon are progress and Amazon, and certainly buying most anything you can think of from home with next day delivery is super convenient, but there is something I miss about the well-stocked brick and mortar stores of old.
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I remember saving up money so I could build my own tool collection as a teenager in the 1970’s. I bought craftsman tools at Sears. My grandfather was a loyal Sears consumer.
They’ve been sinking for years. Quality went down and few things even made in USA. Nothing like the old Sears.
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My favorite store in the 80s. Empty hole in the mall now.
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And from Black Friday through 24DEC it was practically like a giant sardine can. My parents would have to circle circle the parking lot forever, waiting for a spot to open up.
Progress and Amazon are progress and Amazon, and certainly buying most anything you can think of from home with next day delivery is super convenient, but there is something I miss about the well-stocked brick and mortar stores of old.
I question whether it is really progress.
Our retail economy across the whole spectrum is now more "efficient" but has now become much more fragile. A shock someplace across the world is now felt locally.
We save dollars and get immediate satisfaction, globalists make billions while putting the whole economy at risk.
The USA doesn't make many of the essential goods that were considered essential for national security any longer and there is little redundancy to fall back on during disruptions.
We believed the globalists and sold out our country for cheap crap from China/overseas.
I've repented of my support for libertarian free trade global markets and open borders, a little late as the horse left the barn already.
Turns out Pat Buchannan was right on those issues all along.
The Sears where I grew up had a counter where they sold nuts that were under heat lamps, man I loved the smell and buying warm cashews!
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I remember saving up money so I could build my own tool collection as a teenager in the 1970’s. I bought craftsman tools at Sears. My grandfather was a loyal Sears consumer.
They’ve been sinking for years. Quality went down and few things even made in USA. Nothing like the old Sears.
Yes. Same here. I have a bunch of my Dad's, my Grandfather's and my Great Grandfather's tools, and many of them are Craftsman. Nothing says nostalgic fun like using your Great Grandfather's 1920s era Craftsman ratchet.
When I got out of college in 1987 I did the same thing... I started buying Craftsman tools and building my toolkit. It was almost a rite of passage.
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"And from Black Friday through 24DEC it was practically like a giant sardine can."
Last time I went to a mall (or shopping anywhere brick and mortar, really) on Black Friday was probably 1986. It was absolutely INSANE how many people were in that mall. Every store we went in had lines 10 and 12 or more people deep waiting to check out.
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Our first Christmas after we were married (1982) my wife bought me good sized set of Craftsman tools. I've lost a few over the years (I'm pretty sure the kids helped with that, a lot) but I don't think I've broken any, might have worn out a screwdriver or two, still use them on at least a weekly basis.
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I still remember as a kid, going to a three story (with escalators!) Sears with my parents and them letting me wander the toy, sports, and tool sections on my own. It was almost like going on a family outing, like the department store in A Christmas Story. What a difference 50 years makes.
My brother and I had the exact same experience growing up. The whole family even dressed up a bit to go to Sears. Those were the days when Sears sold Ted Williams-branded firearms.
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Over the years I broke a couple of sockets and screwdrivers. It was great being able to walk into a Sears store and replace it with another one, no muss, no fuss, no crap.
Does Craftsman still have that policy now that they're owned by Black and Decker?
OK, they still do. I just pulled this off the Craftsman tools website.
"Full Lifetime Warranty
If the product fails to perform for any reason, we will replace it.
Hammers & Demolition Tools
Finishing Tools
Hex Key
Knives & Multi-tools
Nut Drivers
Pliers
Ratchet & Sockets
Screwdrivers
Wrenches & Wrench Sets
Note: Same warranty for all new CRAFTSMAN models (Model # starting with “CMHT”) and older models (Model # starting with “9”)
No proof of purchase required. Return damaged product to a stocking Retail Partner or contact Customer Care for details."
Now that I know that the tools carry the same warranty as the old Craftsman line sold by Sears I'm not so loath to purchase Craftsman hand tools anymore. I really haven't purchased much in the way of hand tools for a number of years, as I've got a LOT, and what I have been purchasing has generally been Kobalt from Lowes, but I may start buying Craftsman again.
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Speaking of the Craftsman tools, the tool aisles at Sears had a distinctive smell also!
Funny how smells and memories are linked.
The Craftsman tool aisles were on the bottom floor, had to take the escalator down to get there. The nuts were at the bottom of the escalator on the way to the tools. Good times as a kid.
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I started buying Craftsman tools and building my toolkit. It was almost a rite of passage.
For all of us, I think. I got my first car at 17, and my dad bought me a Craftsman tool kit that Christmas. I'd had Craftsman and other tools before that, but this was my first "real" tool kit - one of their however many hundred piece kits in a nice toolbox. =)
That was a real father to son gift, and I was infuriated when some years later the kit was stolen from me when I was working in the oil patch.
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The USA doesn't make many of the essential goods that were considered essential for national security any longer and there is little redundancy to fall back on during disruptions.
This is the worst of it, IMO. Especially now in the age of covid, people might see that we would be way better off paying 15-20% more for many goods and services, but have the manufacture and distribution of those goods on our own soil. Especially critical goods like pharmaceuticals and computer chips.
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Like many of you, I built up my hand tool collection from Sears. I have two rolling mechanic's tool chests in the garage, and just about all the sockets, ratchets, breaker bars, nut drivers, etc. are Craftsman. When my wife was alive, any time we went to the mall she would leave me in the Sears hardware department while she would do her thing, and we'd agree to meet in food court a half hour or an hour later.
The Sears in both malls within range of home have been closed for several years. There were also two Sears Hardware stores within range, and they both folded several years ago.
Even before the end, things were clearly going downhill. The size of the tools and hardware department was constantly shrinking within the stores. When I was young, if you managed to break a Craftsman ratchet they replaced it with a new one from stock. Toward the end, they maintained a cache of (poorly) repaired, used ones under the counter, so if you returned one they replaced it with a rebuilt. Which offered about a 50/50 chance of being any better than you one you were turning in.
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"The nuts were at the bottom of the escalator on the way to the tools."
So you could get warm nuts at Sears, but you had to eat the washers cold.
Weird. :rofl:
"Speaking of the Craftsman tools, the tool aisles at Sears had a distinctive smell also!"
Yep, I always figured it was a combination of the rust proofing oil that they coated the tools with AND the smell of the plastic on the screwdriver handles.
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"That was a real father to son gift, and I was infuriated when some years later the kit was stolen from me when I was working in the oil patch."
A few years before my Mom died I was doing some work at her house. I left one of my Dad's toolboxes on the back porch overnight. It had a bunch of his Craftsman hand tools in it.
The next morning it was gone.
Some *expletive deleted*ing low life, probably a local druggie, hopped the fence and stole it.
I would have gladly beaten the thief with any of the various heavy-duty tools that were in that box. That still pisses me off that because I got lazy I now don't have half of my Dad's tools that he left to me in his will.
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. . . I still remember as a kid, going to a three story (with escalators!) Sears with my parents and them letting me wander the toy, sports, and tool sections on my own. It was almost like going on a family outing, like the department store in A Christmas Story. What a difference 50 years makes.
I remember much the same - going to a multi-story Sears store in Chicago. They had big toy, tool, and sporting goods sections, and even a rack full of GUNS. This was probably pre-GCA '68 so the guns - though locked up - were in a regular store rack and not behind a counter. I was too young to REALLY know what I was looking at, but it seemed pretty cool to me. Tucked under one of the stairwells was a hot dog stand run by "Peggy Kellog" - they had GREAT chili dogs. When walking through the store you'd hear little "plink" chimes from time to time - messages directed toward specific employees or departments rather than voice pages over the PA. And I kind of remember vacuum tube systems moving things (money?) from the cash registers to (presumably) the accounting department, just like the drive up tellers at banks today. Craftsman and Kenmore were - quite rightly - highly respected brands back then. Heck, in addition to "vintage" Craftsman hand tools, I still use a Kenmore canister vacuum cleaner that must be 40 years old or so.
And of course, nearly everything was Made In USA, and people usually used cash - sometimes checks - rather than credit cards.
All that is gone now. And the thing is, with their established mail and phone order business, Sears was positioned to take advantage of the Internet - they COULD have been Amazon. But a long line of management blunders (as well as ethically suspect actions later on by the top brass) ultimately killed the store.
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All that is gone now. And the thing is, with their established mail and phone order business, Sears was positioned to take advantage of the Internet - they COULD have been Amazon. But a long line of management blunders (as well as ethically suspect actions later on by the top brass) ultimately killed the store.
I was working there when that happened, to say it was a cluster * is an understatement. Upper management just couldn't wrap their brains around on why would people would order something over that soon to be gone fad thing called the internet when they could drive to Sears and happily pay more. When they started to see the writing on the wall they couldn't get pass viewing Sear's own attempt at an online store as merely something to draw people into the stores and nothing more. Sears management was struck in the 1950s. They couldn't understand Walmart let alone the internet.
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I was working there when that happened, to say it was a cluster * is an understatement. Upper management just couldn't wrap their brains around on why would people would order something over that soon to be gone fad thing called the internet when they could drive to Sears and happily pay more. When they started to see the writing on the wall they couldn't get pass viewing Sear's own attempt at an online store as merely something to draw people into the stores and nothing more. Sears management was struck in the 1950s. They couldn't understand Walmart let alone the internet.
I would imagine that the Kmart takeover and their management didn't help things?
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I would imagine that the Kmart takeover and their management didn't help things?
I was out by that time.
Combining KM and Sears resulted in something similar to this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadillac_Cimarron
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Eddie Lampert's Folly, though I think he ultimately got exactly what he wanted. What little I can find indicates he's quietly buying up the real property holdings at pennies on the dollar.
Brad
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^^^I think Sears leadership carefully planned this to enrich themselves personally, by selling off the brick and mortar assets and profiting off the real estate assets.
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I remember much the same - going to a multi-story Sears store in Chicago. They had big toy, tool, and sporting goods sections, and even a rack full of GUNS. This was probably pre-GCA '68 so the guns - though locked up - were in a regular store rack and not behind a counter. I was too young to REALLY know what I was looking at, but it seemed pretty cool to me. Tucked under one of the stairwells was a hot dog stand run by "Peggy Kellog" - they had GREAT chili dogs. When walking through the store you'd hear little "plink" chimes from time to time - messages directed toward specific employees or departments rather than voice pages over the PA. And I kind of remember vacuum tube systems moving things (money?) from the cash registers to (presumably) the accounting department, just like the drive up tellers at banks today. Craftsman and Kenmore were - quite rightly - highly respected brands back then. Heck, in addition to "vintage" Craftsman hand tools, I still use a Kenmore canister vacuum cleaner that must be 40 years old or so.
And of course, nearly everything was Made In USA, and people usually used cash - sometimes checks - rather than credit cards.
All that is gone now. And the thing is, with their established mail and phone order business, Sears was positioned to take advantage of the Internet - they COULD have been Amazon. But a long line of management blunders (as well as ethically suspect actions later on by the top brass) ultimately killed the store.
Up until the 1980s if you found it in the Sears catalog it was quality you could put your money into and expect to last.
When my parents built their house in the mid 80s they picked out Kenmore appliances because they were the best value for the dollar both money and quality wise. The stove and dishwasher lasted 20 years, refrigerator 30 years (and was only replaced because Mom redid the kitchen). Dad bought Craftsman tools up until the 2000s, because they were the cheapest wrenches and sockets that didn’t slip or break.
I remember the big Sears catalogs but sadly that all stopped in early 90s. After that it was pretty much all downhill.
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^^^I think Sears leadership carefully planned this to enrich themselves personally, by selling off the brick and mortar assets and profiting off the real estate assets.
Maybe the ones after I left but the ones while I was there had zero clue. They were fighting Walmart, Circuit City/Best Buy, Lowes/HD, and the internet with a 1950s mindset. People will always shop at and be willing to pay more at Sears because it's Sears. SEARS!
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I was working there when that happened, to say it was a cluster * is an understatement. Upper management just couldn't wrap their brains around on why would people would order something over that soon to be gone fad thing called the internet when they could drive to Sears and happily pay more. When they started to see the writing on the wall they couldn't get pass viewing Sear's own attempt at an online store as merely something to draw people into the stores and nothing more. Sears management was struck in the 1950s. They couldn't understand Walmart let alone the internet.
Same with Montgomery Ward. They couldn't adapt because their corporate mindset was still stuck in the suburban 1950s.
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The "Too big to fail" mindset was very much at play.
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I grew up in a small town. Sears was a long way away. I had no particular view that Sears was any better than anyone else.
That said, when I first got out of college on my own, I bought a Sear automotive tool kit in a small plastic tool box. Had most of the common tools you need to work on a car/truck. I still have that and have used it quite a bit over the years. There was a Sears Hardware near where I lived right after college (late 90's). The tools I got there were okay. The car batteries weren't that good (maybe I bought the cheap ones).
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The car batteries weren't that good (maybe I bought the cheap ones).
The old DieHards were my goto battery I guess into around 2000. At that point I saw a decline in quality.
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When I started there if you wanted a PC you had pretty much one choice in town, Sears.
Then came Circuit City, Best Buy, Computer City who were always cheaper.
Their solution?
Management: Tell them how much greater value they're getting by buying it from Sears.
Us: But it's the same computer for $200 more.
Management: But they getting greater value.
Us: What greater value?
Management: Sears
And then came internet shopping.
Management was stuck on the idea that people would without question pay more to have their receipt say Sears at the top.
Yep, too big to fail.
That mindset didn't fly in the 1990s once the internet got going but you couldn't tell them that.
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The thing with car batteries - there are only a few US and nearby companies that make them.
If you guy a Chinese battery, it has been sitting, for Bob only knows how long, on a container ship. Slowly deteriorating, since they start that when the acid hits the lead. I see a LOT of Walmart batteries that are only a year old that test bad. And I understand that Wally World is wonky about warranty stuff with them.
And... Our three-year batteries are now at $180.
If you drive a ford truck, or something that takes a 65 series, you can get a Motorcraft battery at our stores for $170, and that's one heckuva battery.
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^^^I think Sears leadership carefully planned this to enrich themselves personally, by selling off the brick and mortar assets and profiting off the real estate assets.
Is Jack Welch on the board? Enriched himself by dismantling General Electric and then moved on to Boeing and ruined them.
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Somewhere "back in the day," I bought a used Jeep, got it home, and found that one of the front wheels had a locking lug nut on it -- and, of course, the seller hadn't provided the clover-shaped insert to allow taking it off. Someone in my Jeep club suggested hammering an oversized impact socket onto it and then undoing the lug nut.
So I got out my set of Harbor Fright impact sockets, found the appropriate size, and hammered it onto the lug nut. The socket shattered. So I took a regular Craftsman socket of the same size (not an impact socket) and used that. It did the job just fine, and is still going strong more than 20 years later.
I've probably mentioned that my late wife was from South America. Her older brother was unusual among Chilean men in that he enjoyed tinkering with his cars himself. Somewhere, somehow, he had come into possession of a fairly good sized Craftsman automotive wrench set, which he carried in the back of the cab of his Chevy Colorado extra cab pickup. Keeping anything in a vehicle in Santiago is NOT wise and, eventually, some low-life broke into the truck and stole the tools. My wife reported that he was extremely upset, especially since it was no longer possible to find Craftsman tools in Chile.
So we bought a Craftsman tool set and shipped it to him for Christmas. I don't remember how we shipped it, but I'm sure the shipping cost more than the tools. But -- b-i-l was a happy camper, and I made a friend for life. (Until he passed away a couple of years ago).
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Is Jack Welch on the board? Enriched himself by dismantling General Electric and then moved on to Boeing and ruined them.
I don't think that's correct.
It was Jim McNerney - a guy who wanted to succeed Welch at GE but was passed over - who left GE and went to 3M (where he didn't do well) and then moved to Boeing. (Where things didn't go well under him either.)
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That notion that "service" would outbid price infested a lot of management who couldn't read the handwriting on the wall. I was an insurance agent for the largest and actually the best one state insurance company for 37 years. It was the 2nd largest insurance company of its designation in the country. (Reciprocal Exchange)
Our board members bought into the notion that we needed outside leadership rather than company mustangs who rose to the top. That occurred about a little over half way through my 37 years. That began a never ending in and out of failed highly edumacated execs screwing things up over and over while they began to centralize a very successful decentralized branch organization. As a result, as there was no more input from the regions that was paid attention to, all decisions were made by the centralized system ran by those who never had a clue what it was that made us so successful because they came from outside the company with a lot of stupid ideas. They continued to preach the service aspect (that was going away) because the centralized system didn't have a clue, while raising prices saying that price doesn't matter when you have good service. Irony was our best product as a result. Most of the idiots had their master's degrees from business schools as well. Human Resources also centralized hiring and began requiring degrees rather than ability. My retirement day was the happiest day in my working life.
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Someone mentioned guns at Sears...
They were still carrying guns into the mid 1970s at the Sears store near me in Central Pennsylvania. I remember seeing rows of Ted Williams shotguns and rifles. I don't recall them carrying handguns, though.
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My first turnbolt centerfire rifle was a Ted Williams (Win 70 blind magazine) Sears sold me for $140 (plus tax, of course)
IMHO, the best thing about Sears was that you could go into one of their parts warehouse stores and buy repair parts for about anything they sold, not to mention the scratch-and-dent appliances. Those were the days….
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I got curious and instead of waiting till the next time I drove to Oregon, just looked it up on the interwebz.
The Sears in Ontario, OR is called a Sears Hometown Store. A locally owned "Sears" store. That's a new one on me.
https://www.searshometownstores.com/home/or/ontario/3379
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I got curious and instead of waiting till the next time I drove to Oregon, just looked it up on the interwebz.
The Sears in Ontario, OR is called a Sears Hometown Store. A locally owned "Sears" store. That's a new one on me.
https://www.searshometownstores.com/home/or/ontario/3379
The Hometown stores have been a thing for a while now. However, many of them have closed in recent years, too. The one where we used to live in Lebanon, OR closed before we moved here to NC. The one just up the road from us in Sawmills, NC closed a couple of years ago. I suspect the remaining ones across the country will be gone soon.
Like many in this thread have stated, I also have fond memories of the big Sears and Monkey Wards stores from my youth. Too bad their management teams couldn't (or wouldn't) keep up with and adjust to the changing times.
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Too bad their management teams couldn't (or wouldn't) keep up with and adjust to the changing times.
On that, I have always thought that there was a missing niche market that Sears, etc. could have easily filled. There are SO many times that I would liked to have first seen and handled something that I bought online, even if it meant taking more time than clicking the "buy" button. Sears could have become a hybrid of brick and mortar and internet where they kept minimal stock on hand of a myriad of items that people could actually see in person, then order right there for next day delivery.
I mean, that has sorta always been done with things like big appliances. You go to the store, check out the display, then buy it and arrange delivery and install. You could use the same demo model for a ton of other stuff.
Maybe that's just me and there really isn't such a market. People are now buying cars sight unseen like they are an Amazon purchase. That's something I could never do for a big ticket item like that, but I might be in the minority.
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I got curious and instead of waiting till the next time I drove to Oregon, just looked it up on the interwebz.
The Sears in Ontario, OR is called a Sears Hometown Store. A locally owned "Sears" store. That's a new one on me.
https://www.searshometownstores.com/home/or/ontario/3379
Some years back, a Sears Hometown Store opened up with much fanfare nearby. Relatively small place, some tools, but IIRC mostly Kenmore home appliances.
The Kenmore home appliance brand had already gone downhill by that time, so the store got little traffic and didn't last long.
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Every manufacturer does or has made the Kenmore appliances you see in the store. Many used it as a testbed for things that wouldn't do on their name brand products.
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The Hometown stores have been a thing for a while now. However, many of them have closed in recent years, too. The one where we used to live in Lebanon, OR closed before we moved here to NC. The one just up the road from us in Sawmills, NC closed a couple of years ago. I suspect the remaining ones across the country will be gone soon.
Like many in this thread have stated, I also have fond memories of the big Sears and Monkey Wards stores from my youth. Too bad their management teams couldn't (or wouldn't) keep up with and adjust to the changing times.
The Sears at valley river center mall in Eugene, OR is so gone the attached building was demolished.
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Every manufacturer does or has made the Kenmore appliances you see in the store. Many used it as a testbed for things that wouldn't do on their name brand products.
When our drier died a few years ago we ordered a new one from Sears. I forget the maker of the old one. The new one turned out to be the exact same thing, with Kenmore branding. The new lint filter we had bought, was exactly the same.