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We Buy their appliances. we Buy their hardware. Our local sears store is WAY too small they should make it larger to compete with the other large anchors in that mall, but they don't. Do like the land's end stuff. Buy lots of clothes there. And you have to hit sales, which they have all the time and get a good deal there. We generally go to the larger store which is about 30 minutes away from us.
I agree their customer floor service stinks. I used to work at the 2nd largest store in their chain, throughout the late 70s to mid 80s. Mid 80s is when the customer service started to tank. And they were constantly "tweaking" the stores and the layouts of the merchandise, which only served to PO the customers there actually.
Much preferable to our local walmart - which always looks like a bomb went off, totally NO floor help whatsoever and most of the products are cheap and fall apart.
What a shame. Like any other retailer, it seems that there are always some stores that are better run than others, and unfortunately those lesser stores will always drag down the company as a whole. I had hoped that the merge would produce some positive results, but deep-down I doubt that they will ever win against the onslaught of Target and Walmart.
Like others have stated, I've always purchased Kenmore appliances and Craftsman products and Diehard batteries, and will hopefully continue to do so. I would rather shop at a good K-Mart than a Walmart anyday.
Has anyone worked for Sears Holdings' corporate at Hoffman Estates? I was offered a job and was wondering what the corporate culture was and how people enjoyed working there. Thank you in advance.
Wellllll, how to put this politely -- it sucks? Various friends that have left Hoffman Estates in the past months / years have experience in the IT, retail operations, and financing areas. Pretty much all say the culture is a step above "the beating will continue until morale improves", but only a small step. You have to realize that once upon a time this was THE place to build a career, now adays even strng retailers like Target, Gap, WalMart and Best Buy are quaking. The shear amount of bad news that retail has caused a friend to say: "there may be worse places to work, but you'd be called an 'inmate' if you worked in one"...
My take is the good people left a loooong time ago. Those that are left are mostly end-of-career types, those that have no other options, and those who live real close by and just don't give a damn any more...
The share price of SHLD has been falling all year, and all you need to do is google Eddie Lampert to find out why -- the guy made a lot of money as a trader but has zero credibility as a hands-on leader of a retailer --he is making a bad situation worse...
If you have another option it might make sense to pursue that...
Sears is one of those companies that leaves me scratching my head, trying to understand their business strategy.
Um, what business strategy?
Quote:
Originally Posted by superk
I doubt that they will ever win against the onslaught of Target and Walmart.
Sears/KMart is toast. There's no possible way to turn the company around, especially in the current economic climate.
Sears never had the financial muscle to engage in the practices Wal*Mart uses, which is Wal*Mart tells its suppliers what it will pay and what it will sell the products for. You either agree to Wal*Mart's terms, or Wal*Mart refuses to sell any of your products. Nestle and few others actually went bankrupt because of Wal*Mart's policies.
Quote:
The effects of monopsony also can be difficult to pin down. But again we have easy illustrations ready to hand, in the surprising recent tribulations of two iconic American firms—Coca-Cola and Kraft. Coca-Cola is the quintessential seller of a product based on a “secret formula.” Recently, though, Wal-Mart decided that it did not approve of the artificial sweetener Coca-Cola planned to use in a new line of diet colas. In a response that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago, Coca-Cola yielded to the will of an outside firm and designed a second product to meet Wal-Mart's decree. Kraft, meanwhile, is a producer that only four years ago was celebrated by Forbes for “leading the charge” in a “brutal industry.” Yet since 2004, Kraft has announced plans to shut thirty-nine plants, to let go 13,500 workers, and to eliminate a quarter of its products. Most reports blame soaring prices of energy and raw materials, but in a truly free market Kraft could have pushed at least some of these higher costs on to the consumer. This, however, is no longer possible. Even as costs rise, Wal-Mart and other discounters continue to demand that Kraft lower its prices further. Kraft has found itself with no other choice than to swallow the costs, and hence to tear itself to pieces.
The only possible strategy where Sears might survive is to eliminate nearly all of their stores and focus on distributing the Craftsman and Kenmore product lines through other retail outlets. They might keep a "show-room" style store strategically located that focuses on those products. Their clothing lines and such they'll have to shift to almost exclusively on-line sales.
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Sears Holdings Corporate Experience
