For a while now, we’ve found something kind of confusing about communications that come from the parent company of Sears and Kmart, Sears Holdings. They refer to their customers as “members,” even though they are not a warehouse club and anyone can shop there. This holiday season, though, they’ve arranged a special members-only event: an exclusive sale the Sunday before Thanksgiving. [More]
tears for sears
Sears Hires Experienced Consumer Appliance Executive To Run Hardlines, Maybe Sell Stuff
By 8.25.15
In a department or discount store, “hardlines” refers to tools, appliances, and furniture: the items that your parents still shop at Sears for, but that you don’t. Sears has hired a new executive in charge of their hardlines departments, which include the company’s three most important house brands: Kenmore appliances, Diehard automobile batteries, and Craftsman tools. [More]
Sears Holdings Reports First Profit Since 2012, Not From Actual Retailing
By 8.20.15
We’ve had a longtime joke here at Consumerist that Sears Holdings isn’t actually a retail company, but an advanced anti-capitalist prank pretending to run a retail company. We expected the company to either turn things around or go out of business. What’s happening instead is something that some retail observers had predicted: the company is profitable for the first time in years, but only because it sold a few hundred million dollars’ worth of stores. [More]
Sears Is Hiring For Its Call Centers, Holds Job Fair In Alabama
By 8.11.15
It may surprise you to learn that Sears Holdings, a company that has been shedding jobs as it slims down its retail presence, is giving hope to people who are unemployed, but it’s true. The company is hiring for 100 new positions at its call center in Alabama, explaining that the closure of physical stores means that some of those sales shift online. [More]
Sears Holdings Comparable-Store Sales Down More Than 10% In Last 3 Months
By 8.3.15
In all of our reporting on the recent woes of Sears Holdings, the real message is that we want Sears to stage a comeback and return to the retail greatness of decades past. Yet things don’t look very promising over at Sears HQ, and today the department store chain announced that its sales across comparable stores have fallen more than 10% in the last quarter. [More]
Lands’ End Still Making Its Way After Divorce From Sears
By 7.28.15
The new CEO of Lands’ End, who came to the company from high fashion brand Dolce & Gabbana, wasn’t a customer of the company before she went to work there because she wanted their classic basics for her own wardrobe. No, she shopped there to get her kid’s school uniforms. Now she’s leading the company into its future after the divorce from Sears Holdings. [More]
Sears Hometown Wants To Remind You That They’re Still Here
By 7.22.15
Hello, person on Sears mailing lists! Did you know that, even though your local Sears store may have closed, there’s still a Sears nearby? It’s true, in the form of a Sears Hometown store. Please come visit. [More]
Sears-Affiliated Real Estate Investment Trust Raises $1.6 Billion
By 7.7.15
If you’ve always secretly wanted to be the partial landlord of a Sears or Kmart store, you have some unusual and specific life goals. You can also achieve your goal as of this week. The real estate investment trust spun off from Sears Holdings, Seritage Growth Properties, is now selling shares to the public, and the offering has been successful so far, raising more than $1.6 billion. [More]
Sears Leadership Still Convinced That Rewards Program Will Save The Company
By 6.8.15
Shop Your Way Rewards is not a difficult program to join. The process consists of giving your e-mail address to a cashier at Sears or Kmart, and…that’s pretty much it. It doesn’t cost anything. Yet the leadership of Sears Holdings Corporation remains fixed on the program and the idea of having “members” rather than customers, and we still can’t figure out why. [More]
Sears Shareholders Sue, Claim CEO Is Stripping Company For Parts
By 6.1.15
For many years here at Consumerist, we developed a theory that the venerable department store Sears was secretly a vast anti-capitalist prank, which actively avoided selling merchandise. Its goal was something else: perhaps waiting for the retail real estate market to turn around and cash in the land and buildings that it owns. A group of Sears Holdings shareholders are starting to think the same thing, and they’ve filed a lawsuit against the company and its manifesto-writing CEO, Eddie Lampert. [More]
Sears Says Clothing Brand Breakup With Kardashians Was Mutual
By 5.6.15
Earlier this week, we sort of paid attention to celebrity news when we heard that the famous Kardashian sisters were ending their clothing line partnership with Sears because they didn’t want to be associated with the brand. That’s not so, Sears representatives said today: their split with the reality television stars was mutual. [More]
Sears To Sell $300 Million In Property To Joint Venture With Mall Owner Macerich
By 4.30.15
A few weeks ago, Sears Holdings announced that it would be starting a joint venture with mall operator Simon Properties. This new company would buy Sears stores, then lease them back to the company in an effort to raise some quick cash and keep the company’s retail operations retailing. Now Sears has announced a similar deal with another mall owner, Macerich Properties. [More]
Sears Announces Final Two Stores They’ll Be Sharing With Primark
By 4.22.15
Last year, as part of their “taking on roommates” strategy of keeping their doors open, Sears announced that they were leasing parts of seven stores to Primark, a clothing retailer out of Ireland. Sears has finally named all seven of the stores where Primark will be moving in. All seven are in the Northeast. [More]
Sears Promises Early Payment To Vendors, Ties Up Cash Flow
By 3.18.15
While Sears struggles to get customers into its stores and lost $1.7 billion last year, the retailer is also encountering problems in keeping its shelves stocked with merchandise. The company’s vendors are reportedly nervous to ship to the retailer given its poor financial results and touchy cash flow situation. Vendors are asking Sears to pay their bills sooner in exchange for a discount. This ties up tens of millions of extra dollars’ worth of capital up at a time. [More]
Sears Holdings Lost $1.7 Billion In 2014, Considers This An Improvement
By 2.26.15
Sears Holdings has many assets: mostly, stores in malls that are slumping toward irrelevance, and strong brand recognition and loyalty among Americans over age 50 or so. The company is fighting to stay in business, and current efforts like offering Sears Canada stock to investors and selling stores to a real estate investment trust and leasing them back are part of that effort. Is all of this working? Well, Sears leadership sounds optimistic. [More]
Credit-Swap Traders Think Sears Will Fail In The Next Year
By 2.19.15
Credit default swaps are a confusing concept, since some forms resemble gambling on the failure of a company without even owning any stock in it. As a consumer, especially if you’re someone who likes to shop at Sears, you should know that now that Radio Shack has declared bankruptcy, the hot retailer that credit swap traders are betting will fail is Sears. [More]
New Lands’ End CEO Sees Company As A ‘Global Lifestyle Brand’
By 2.2.15
When you think of “Lands’ End,” you probably don’t think “high fashion.” Yet the brand has hired Federica Marchionni, the president of Dolce & Gabbana USA, to be the company’s new CEO. Will Marchionni be able to turn Lands’ End into a global luxury brand and help it find a more profitable identity after breaking off its 13-year relationship with Sears? [More]
Sears To Close Parts Distribution Center In Dallas, Lay Off 77
By 1.6.15
The new year has barely started, but it’s already time to shed a few more tears for Sears. The American retailing legend is trying to stage a comeback as a place where Americans are willing to shop again. Part of that comeback is shedding stores and facilities that it no longer needs. It’s time to add facility to that list: a parts distribution center in Dallas that employs 77 people. [More]
