Sears blew it so bad. They were essentially Amazon before Amazon, with that huge catalogue. All they had to do was put that catalogue online, and they could have easily been first to market.
Instead, they had a board of old coots with that old “I don’t even know how to turn ON a computer” attitude that was common in the 90s among old farts. They thought that was some kind of brag. I heard it in my old company, too. Those fucking arrogant losers sat in their boardroom congratulating themselves, as the Internet steadily ate their market share to nothing.
I mean the mismanagement didn’t help at all. Forcing different departments to compete with each other, some departments spinning up redundant support teams that were exclusive to their department, etc.
With halfway decent management Sears was in a good position to continue holding a massive and controlling portion of the American household market, the problem is they had inept owners managing the company who managed to snatch bankruptcy from the jaws of success
It doesn’t help that it was owned by a hedge fund that made bank on Sears’ demise such as by saddling Sears with a ton of debt, 40% of which was owned by Sears’ parent company
Oh, I hadn’t realized that Sears was one of those companies that got broken up and sold off, like Toys R Us. That always sucks.
The difference is that Sears wasn’t offering anything that you couldn’t buy from anywhere else, and was struggling against competition in the best of times, while Toys R Us pretty much owned the market, and was doing well when they were murdered as a company. Sears kind of deserved their fate, Toys R Us did not.
Also, it’s amazing that Penny’s, Sears’ primary competition, is still around and doing pretty well, or surviving at least, mostly because they made the jump to online sales in time.
It wasn’t exactly the same. The guy who bought them was mostly interested in pillaging the real estate, which he sold to himself at a huge discount. He then decided to show off the superiority of his randian philosophy by enacting policies that very quickly destroyed what was left.
Sears blew it so bad. They were essentially Amazon before Amazon, with that huge catalogue. All they had to do was put that catalogue online, and they could have easily been first to market.
Instead, they had a board of old coots with that old “I don’t even know how to turn ON a computer” attitude that was common in the 90s among old farts. They thought that was some kind of brag. I heard it in my old company, too. Those fucking arrogant losers sat in their boardroom congratulating themselves, as the Internet steadily ate their market share to nothing.
I mean the mismanagement didn’t help at all. Forcing different departments to compete with each other, some departments spinning up redundant support teams that were exclusive to their department, etc.
I don’t know about all that, but it sounds like another problem with the top management again.
It seems like they had an attitude that Sears has always existed, and will always exist. It can’t be killed.
Yes, it can.
With halfway decent management Sears was in a good position to continue holding a massive and controlling portion of the American household market, the problem is they had inept owners managing the company who managed to snatch bankruptcy from the jaws of success
It doesn’t help that it was owned by a hedge fund that made bank on Sears’ demise such as by saddling Sears with a ton of debt, 40% of which was owned by Sears’ parent company
Oh, I hadn’t realized that Sears was one of those companies that got broken up and sold off, like Toys R Us. That always sucks.
The difference is that Sears wasn’t offering anything that you couldn’t buy from anywhere else, and was struggling against competition in the best of times, while Toys R Us pretty much owned the market, and was doing well when they were murdered as a company. Sears kind of deserved their fate, Toys R Us did not.
Also, it’s amazing that Penny’s, Sears’ primary competition, is still around and doing pretty well, or surviving at least, mostly because they made the jump to online sales in time.
It wasn’t exactly the same. The guy who bought them was mostly interested in pillaging the real estate, which he sold to himself at a huge discount. He then decided to show off the superiority of his randian philosophy by enacting policies that very quickly destroyed what was left.
I just went to a JCPenney closing sale the other day while I’m living near a Sears that’s still open haha
I thought all the Sears stores were closed.
Nope, five are still open.