Ok, but here’s what I was originally looking for.
Christ, the late 70s hits me on some kind of a primal level. There’s just something about those early years that sticks in the subconscious.
http://www.wishbookweb.com/FB/1979_Sears_Wishbook/files/assets/basic-html/page-620.html
That’s awesome. Funny enough, I remember picking up the dewback from Sears that my parents had mail ordered.
Ms. Cates and Living in Stereo is primal enough.
Not The Star Wars ‘n’ Whatnot ™ but do you remember this?
I sure do. I had that and “cowboys and indians” version (it had a tall mountain and shorter one connected by a rock bridge) as well. I loved those things.
EDIT: Marx Comanche Pass is what it was called.
The last time we went to a Sears was a while ago. But they were already kind of a ghost store. The wife wanted to look at clothes and I went to the tool area. Let’s just say that there was a few opened boxes of wrenches in the tool area. That’s it. We met a few minutes later. The clothes section was a mess. As we were leaving we saw a few TVs in a clearance area. The wife liked one of them, for the price. But it was wrapped in tape. We actually found a guy that worked there and we asked him if we could check the TV out.
He said, “You see how it’s wrapped up? I Don’t feel like doing that again. But truthfully? Don’t buy it.”
We left.
My BFF across the street had that one. It was awesome!
I just got a Sears offer. Like I will trust Sears cash.
I’m going to miss their point system. I never fully understood how they could make money by giving me stuff for almost free all the time.
I feel the same. A lot of things were overpriced, but with points you usually got a pretty good deal, and sometimes got a great deal. Sadly, after our local Sears closed done, it want worth it, since I liked to order things for pick up.
Me too. It was also a great reminder for me as to why I don’t actually shop in the store. It’s like entering a graveyard, unpleasant, lacking life in general and you wondered just how long this old unattractive stuff had been sitting there.They were also a great place to buy Christmas stuff after Christmas. They always had stuff because no one really shopped there during Christmas either.
I hated the store, love the in store pick up.
I think that would be an interesting model. Minimum store front, just a place to pick up online purchases. Basically, the store as a glorified impulse rack for online shopping.
By a TV and while you wait, grab some snacks and HDMI cables (overpriced, but convenient).
I just feel like Sears could have done so much to set themselves apart, including going back to it’s catalog roots.
They used to run stores like that @legowarrior - they were called (IIRC) “Sears Catalog Stores.” There was one in Leesburg when we moved here in the late '80s. It was in a fairly small storefront… maybe 1/3 the size of a new Rite Aid or the like. They had shelving with stuff on it (mostly tools and yard stuff, including lawnmowers) in a very bare-bones environment (metal shelves and almost nothing else in the store, maybe a few signs), but the main draw of the store was that you could order from the catalog or online and have your items delivered to that store, where you’d walk to the counter in the back and pick it up. It was in an older shopping center so I wouldn’t be surprised if it had opened in the 60s when Leesburg and Loudoun County were just little flyspecks on the map.
I guess the combination of a store opening “close enough” (I’m guessing the one at Dulles Town Center, about 7 miles away) and with the advent of the internet being used for shopping they must have decided they didn’t need it any more, and it closed.
I got my Atari 800XL system from either a Sears or Wards catalog store back in the day. They were widespread in rural areas I think. The town 16 miles away (population about 2,000) had one (maybe several for different chains) then.
I saw—maybe earlier in this thread?—that modern small town Sears stores that are privately owned are profitable in some cases and their owners are not at all happy with corporate, as you might imagine. Those are stores with a small selection of goods, often of the appliance/lawn care variety (think washing machines and lawn mowers). Sears Hometown is the nomenclature; it was spun off from Sears Holdings a few years ago and isn’t in bankruptcy. (My googling showed tons of news stories with owners reassuring customers they weren’t going bankrupt.) Still, their future seems shaky.
Time to re-brand.
Meanwhile in Canada, pensioners are trying to get at some big dividend payouts. The big shareholder who benefited from the rather generous dividend payouts is of course ESL, Edward S. Lampert’s company.
If you thought they were done closing Sears stores, you’d be WRONG!!!
I wouldn’t expect them to be done until they close the last sears store. It is my assumption that the chain is doomed, and at some pint in the not too distant future, it will be referred to in the past tense, and then forgotten about entirely except for business majors, as it will serve as warning of what not to do.
I was surprised they still had 40 stores left to close.
FTFY.
I have zero doubt that business schools these days espouse the glory and PROFIT! of pure vulture capitalism, with Eddie “Lamprey” Lampert’s portrait prominently featured.
He should be drained of money into he’s as poor as the poorest employee that got laid off.
