Sears had a deal with the Holly Hill Mall in Burlington, NC that isn’t unusual: the retailer gave the mall a small percentage of its sales instead of paying a fixed rent. That amount has evidently fallen over the years as the popularity and business prospects of Sears fell, and now the mall has sued Sears for failing to keep up its end of the lease. [More]
tears for sears
At Least 24 More Kmart Stores To Close By End Of 2016
By 9.19.16
At the end of last week, employees at Kmart stores across the country received bad but not entirely unexpected news: their stores are closing by the end of 2016, and they will lose their jobs. We can confirm that dozens of locations in 11 states plan to close on or before Dec. 11, and will most likely add more locations to this list later today or later this week. [More]
Moody’s Is Kind Of Worried About Sears Holdings, Especially Kmart
By 9.14.16
While Sears Holdings keeps trudging along its alleged “path to profitability,” Moody’s Investors Service has some doubts about the retailer’s prospects, and has downgraded its liquidity rating. That means that its analysts are concerned about the ability of Sears Holdings to keep its doors open and merchandise on the shelves. [More]
Kmart Realizes Maybe It Should Try Communicating With Its Own Employees
By 7.29.16
Last weekend, a story hit the Internet about the current fears of Kmart employees that they’re being asked to move all stock to the sales floor because the company is in slow-motion liquidation. The communications staff at Kmart’s parent company, Sears Holdings, realized that they had to do something when news outlets began sending them questons about the employees’ accounts. Maybe they also needed to communicate a little better with store employees. [More]
Kmart Employees Report Sudden Merchandise Purges, General Sense Of Doom
By 7.25.16
Kmart isn’t closing all of its stores. Nope. That’s the company’s official policy, and what they tell anyone who asks. Yes, they’re closing some stores, both gradually and in big batches, but that’s part of the company’s “transformation from a traditional, store-network based retail business model to a more asset-light, member-centric integrated retailer.” Yet some employees are quietly worried that the whole chain is about to shut down. Update: Kmart denies this report. [More]
All That’s Left At The Oldest Remaining Sears Are Fixtures And Khakis
By 7.12.16
The Sears store on Lawrence Avenue in Chicago is winding down operations. That’s a normal part of the retail cycle: when a store is no longer making money, you shut it down. What’s different about this store closure is that the Lawrence location was one of the oldest still-operating Sears department stores, open in that location for 91 years. It survived the Great Depression, but not the era of e-commerce and of Eddie Lampert. [More]
Sears Expands Another House Brand, Sells Kenmore TVs
By 6.22.16
A few weeks ago, Sears announced with its quarterly earnings that it was looking into doing some unspecified money-making thing with its signature house brands: Kenmore, Craftsman, and DieHard. Most observers assumed that this meant selling the brands, since Sears Holdings needs some cash flow. Instead, the company is expanding the brands to include new and related like DieHard car tires and now Kenmore-brand televisions. [More]
Sears Holdings Cares More About Wall Street Than About Customers, And That’s Why It’s Doomed
By 6.16.16
Eddie Lampert, the manifesto-writing hedge fund manager who runs Sears Holdings, the company that owns Sears and Kmart, doesn’t understand retail. That’s isn’t always a bad thing in a manager: sometimes leaders with fresh perspective bring in fresh ideas. For Sears and Kmart, it’s meant over a decade of no investment in the company and the slowest liquidation and dismantling in retail history. [More]
The 5 Meanest Quotes From Report On Sad State Of Sears
By 6.3.16
Last week, Sears all but admitted that it was looking to cast off the little that remains of its identity with the possible sell-off of its signature house brands Kenmore, DieHard, and Craftsman. What the heck happened to this once-great pillar of American retail? A number of industry insiders have their theories, and they aren’t pulling punches. [More]
Raiders Of The Lost Walmart Uncover Ancient Memory Stick At Sears
By 5.18.16
A “memory stick” sounds like some kind of fascinating tribal artifact, perhaps a staff that elders hold while telling ancient legends. In electronics, of course, it was a revolutionary flash storage device from the late ’90s that made taking digital photos cheaper and easier, eliminating the need to attach a floppy drive to your digital camera. Unless, of course, you’re Sears. [More]
Sears Will Close Its Oldest Operating Store, Which Opened In Chicago In 1925
By 5.6.16 — Updated: 1.4.17
Corporate cutbacks mean losing company history, and the next store on Sears Holdings’ closing list is historic: having opened in 1925, it’s the oldest still-operating store in the chain. The store, which is in Chicago’s Ravenswood neighborhood, will begin its liquidation sale in two weeks, on May 19, and will ultimately close in August. [More]
Kmart And Sears Add Stores In MI, WV, IA, LA, WI, And GA To Closings List
By 5.3.16
Sears Holdings needs to make some cuts, and has been closing its stores in addition to taking on roommates and cutting back on corporate staff. In addition to the 50 or so store closings that Sears Holdings announced locally at the beginning of the year and the 78 store closings that the company announced two weeks ago, today the news broke that three additional Kmart stores will close in Georgia, Michigan, and West Virginia. [More]
Leasing Brochures Indicate Sears Plans To Shrink 3 More Stores, Rent Out Empty Space
By 3.31.16
On our master list of known Sears and Kmart stores that will be closing in coming months, one item kind of stands out: one store in Albuquerque plans to cut the size of its store in half and close the Auto Center, renting out the rest of the store. Sears appears to be using the same plan in other markets, including three stores in California. [More]
Sears Holdings Plans At Least 4 More Kmart Store Closures In May
By 3.2.16
After a tough year of losing half a billion dollars less than they did in 2014, Sears Holdings, parent company of Sears and Kmart, announced plans to close about 50 stores in the coming months. What the company no longer does is send out big announcements with lists of stores slated for closure, instead submitting local closings to local news outlets. That’s cool, but we’re a national news outlet that likes to pay attention to national trends, so we compiled a list for anyone who is interested. [More]
Sears Loses $580 Million In Last Quarter Of 2015, Still Working On That ‘Transformation’ Thing
By 2.25.16
Earlier this week, we received an email from a reader with a tip for our Sears and Kmart store closings list. We checked it out and learned that her local Sears store was actually staying open, which took her by surprise. “It sure looked like that part of the mall was being taken down,” she wrote, relieved, mirroring many shoppers’ reactions to the continued existence of Sears and Kmart as a company. [More]
Stock Analyst: Sears Is No Longer ‘Viable As A Retailer’
By 2.10.16
You might not realize it when looking at our coverage, but we aren’t cheering for Kmart and Sears, the stores of Sears Holdings, to go out of business. The company’s continued survival is impressive, and sort of a surprise, but one stock analyst thinks that the company won’t survive without doing something drastic. [More]
Sears Holdings To Accelerate, Expand Planned Store Closings
By 2.9.16
The only bit of good news in the most recent financial report from Sears Holdings, parent company of Sears and Kmart, is that the sibling stores had better sales during the holiday season than last year, and not just because they kicked off Christmas in mid-September. Unfortunately, the news isn’t very good other than that: the company is still losing money in its retail business, and plans to speed up its planned store closings. [More]
If Kmart And Sears Stores Close Without A National Press Release, Does Anyone Notice?
By 1.13.16
Last week, department store chain Macy’s announced its holiday season results and its plans to close 40 stores in the coming months. Shoe retailer Finish Line announced plans to close 150 stores by the year 2020. Yet what you never hear about in the national news anymore is how many stores Sears Holdings, corporate parent of Sears and Kmart, is planning to close, even as they continue to shut down underperforming stores. [More]
