Sears to close more stores as holiday sales slump

[PrettySquareGal]

They need to stop blaming the economy. A search of dozens of threads in the FL show just how much of their quality & service has declined over the years! Many of us have looked through old catalogs and recall the way they used to be so that we have a good comparison for how much they have changed.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/12/27/us-sears-sales-idUSTRE7BQ0AV20111227

It would be nice if this was a wake-up call but I doubt it.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

(Obviously the new Kardashian Kollection [ew] for Sears couldn't save them.)

 

[m0nk]

When I was a kid, my parents always shopped at K-Mart and Sears.... eventually Walmart moved into Central PA and we avoided it for better quality and service. When the Walmart sub-standard quality and service became the standard, we started shopping there for the prices, since it didn't make sense to spend more for the same. These days I would rather buy nicer clothing, but it's almost impossible to find better-than-sub-standard. We typically shop at the outlet stores now, since there are 3 towns with them within a 40 minute drive. Or Burlington Coat Factory, since they actually have much nicer clothes for Walmart prices.

Of course, there really is the whole economy thing, which does have an impact, since the cost of everything has been going up gradually for the past 10 years and yet salaries for most Americans haven't really increased.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

The economy affects spending, yes, but Macy's sales are up this year.

 

[Tomasso]

I'm actually a bit surprised that they're still in business. It seems like the upmarket and the discounters are doing fairly well but those in the middle are getting hammered.

 

[C-dot]

I agree, Sears has headed steadily downhill for a long time. Most of the locations around me are dirty and disheveled - even the "upscale" ones are awful. The quality just isn't there.

By contrast, Hudson's Bay Company does very well, and has for years. They're supposedly in the same retail niche... Wonder what went wrong.

 

[sheeplady]

We used to have Kaufmann's and they were basically falling all over you to help you. When the stores put up the Macy's sign, it was like a light switch went from be nice to be nasty (I am not the only one who thinks this way). This past year my husband needed dress shirts for his job so we tried Macy's. I couldn't believe how nice the Macy's staff was- just like they used to be in Kaufmann's. Maybe that accounts for the change in sales and why Macy's is doing better? I've always thought that a good portion the customer service attitude you get in a store comes from the top (in how they treat staff), so perhaps an upper management decided that Macy's needed a change to survive?

I hope Kmart and Sears don't close their stores here. We've made several major purchases from Sears in the past several years and shop at Kmart for our cleaning supplies and dishsoap. I really hate the Walmart near us (for some specific reasons to that store), we drive quite a distance to get to the Sears and Kmart to avoid it.

 

[m0nk]

I think it really may have to do with their business model, and I'm sure the aquisition of K-mart hasn't helped Sears in any way. K-mart should have gone the way of Woolworth's and Jamesway, since the businesses couldn't all compete with Walmart in their market.

Sears could have been on par with Macy's, though I highly doubt if it ever could have continued along the lines of HBC, considering the multi-national and multi-centential legacy of the corporation. Sears lost diversity in recent decades, turning their focus more towards tools and hardware, plus the corporation had a lot of holdings in financial companies that started dragging the company down just before the K-mart merger. They've also tried some other risky things, like a Walmart Supercenter style store, that I don't think took off. Department stores in general have been slowly dying off, and I personally think that it will continue unless they bring quality and customer service back.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Quality and service are only at the forefront when a company's primary purpose is to serve its customers. When a company's primary purpose is maximum return for its shareholders, that purpose will be accomplished at the expense of quality and service. When a company is dominated by the business philosophy of a hedge-fund manager and not a merchant, you can guess what the outcome be.

 

[Tomasso]

When a company is dominated by the business philosophy of a hedge-fund manager and not a merchant, you can guess what the outcome be.

You'd be surprised how many of the chains are controlled by private equity, hedge fund, and real estate concerns. They've been real estate plays for over thirty years.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/08/business/08baker.html?pagewanted=all

 

[C-dot]

I've always thought that a good portion the customer service attitude you get in a store comes from the top (in how they treat staff...

It sure does. If the Company you work for doesn't value you, you don't value them - and by extension, their customers.

My mother refuses to go to Sears after multiple consecutive customer service horror stories, and I won't order from their catalogue after they messed up my order not once, not twice, but three times. In the store, I can't find an associate to help me no matter how hard I try.

 

[Tomasso]

Sales associates are like cops; they're never around when you need them.

 

[dhermann1]

A friend of mine recently ( last fall) interviewed with them for a sales job. They made it clear that it was all about selling extended warranties. I imagine they've priced themselves so low that they can't make any margin on their actual sales, so they need to gouge people with the extended warranties. He said they also made it clear that if you didn't sell lots of those stupid things you'd be out the door pretty quickly.

 

[AtomicEraTom]

I can say first hand that I've witnessed our local K-Mart go down the tubes. I worked there, as did my siblings. My sister actually just quit and came over to the plant a few months ago.

When I started there, when I was 16, things were very good. Business was steady, the store was neat and clean, and we had a loyal base who wouldn't go 'across the street' to Wal-Mart.

Things just went downhill. Stores suffering financially start cutting staff as the first place to save money. They cut the amount of people we had and didn't award those who worked hard. There were no raises, no benefits, nothing. The turnover of employees was wild. By the time I left, 3 years later, there was only a handfull of 'veterans' left. I go in there now and only know a couple people and the folks in Pharmacy. It's sad.

As the staff lacked, more and more people stop coming in. I heard from many customers that they were unhappy with service. I got reprimanded by my boss one time for 'spending too much time with the customers and not enough on projects.' Excuse me? Isn't it the customer that comes first. If I was in back, I'd get paged by people telling me I had customers there asking for me by name or description. I very much liked my job there and hated to leave, but money talks. They asked me to stay, as I was the top seller in the store, but they couldn't offer me enough money to stay, sadly.

Also, the store never got updated. They built our current K-Mart in 1990, and sold the old one next door. I was in there last week and it still looks like a 1990's big box store, only one that's been aged 20 years. It always looks dirty, dated, and a bit unwelcoming. It's really a shame, they used to be the biggest game in town.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Sales associates are like cops; they're never around when you need them.

Only when you're just looking. If you have a question or, God forbid, you want to buy something, then they're all on their break. At Walmart they're always putting everything where you can't find it. You spend at least 15-20 minutes just to buy one item (and that's not even counting standing in line at the check stand). And you can't ask anybody because there's hardly anybody on the floor to ask (and that's assuming that they actually know where anything is!) so you have to go all the way to the front to ask somebody.

 

[sheeplady]

It sure does. If the Company you work for doesn't value you, you don't value them - and by extension, their customers.

My mother refuses to go to Sears after multiple consecutive customer service horror stories, and I won't order from their catalogue after they messed up my order not once, not twice, but three times. In the store, I can't find an associate to help me no matter how hard I try.

I don't go to anyplace that doesn't treat me well, because I figure management isn't treating their people well if they pretty much all are nasty to me. I absolutely *hate* management that treats it's workers badly. I also won't shop or eat places with high turnover for the same reason. There's no reason to treat your staff that badly, they are your money makers.

I know someone who had such a customer service nightmare that she got a free mattress and boxspring. The store's computers were down she she bought it and 6 months went by with no bill. She tried calling to let the company know she hadn't been billed. A customer service rep told her to stop harassing the store as they had no record of the sale and hung up on her.

 

[fortworthgal]

I agree, Sears has headed steadily downhill for a long time. Most of the locations around me are dirty and disheveled - even the "upscale" ones are awful. The quality just isn't there.

ITA, the stores here are atrocious. They haven't been updated, are disheveled and dirty, very few helpful sales associates, and a majority of the merchandise is of questionable quality. No bargains to be found either. I'm actually surprised they're still in business at all.

There aren't any K-Marts in my area, haven't been for years.

(Obviously the new Kardashian Kollection [ew] for Sears couldn't save them.)

Kar-trashians, you mean. :lol:

 

[PrettySquareGal]

kar-trashians, you mean. :lol:

yes!

 

[C-dot]

I know someone who had such a customer service nightmare that she got a free mattress and boxspring. The store's computers were down she she bought it and 6 months went by with no bill. She tried calling to let the company know she hadn't been billed. A customer service rep told her to stop harassing the store as they had no record of the sale and hung up on her.

Unbelieveable! Most people in that situation wouldn't have bothered to call the Company, and that's how they responded? That's yet another reason why I wouldn't shop at Sears.

 

[Connery]

Customer service is horrible. They are not competitive and I have an easier time shopping on line with them. Sears started out as a mail order company and perhaps they should return to their beginnings.[huh]