Slog

News & Arts

Line Out

Music & the City
at Night

« Former Ron Paul Aide Says Ron Paul… | Merry Fucking Christmas, Occupy Bel… »

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Retail Sears to Close 100 to 120 Stores Nationwide

Posted by Paul Constant on Tue, Dec 27, 2011 at 11:03 AM

Sears Holdings Corp. plans to close between 100 and 120 Sears and Kmart stores after poor sales during the holidays, the most crucial time of year for retailers.

Sears was my first employer after I graduated high school. I worked on the replenishment team in the men's department, which meant my job was folding and displaying jeans. I didn't work very hard at all; the majority of the job consisted of trying to operate something called a "Gizmo," which was Sears's very first attempt at a computerized inventory management device. It was basically a super-early version of one of those scanning guns you get nowadays if you're putting together a wedding registry at a department store; you go around and scan barcodes into the machine, which then files the products into a database for easy retrieval. It did not work, and it was ridiculously expensive.

But most of the job consisted of shirking work: An hourlong coffee break in the morning, a lunch break that often stretched to a couple hours, and a huge back room full of stock that I could hide in when I didn't feel like working. It was the kind of work that Republicans think all unionized government work is like: I could foist any customer requests off to a member of the sales team, because I was strictly a stocking employee. As far as minimum wage mall jobs go, it was a dream. I can totally understand why the company is falling apart.

FacebookShare

Comments (16) RSS

Oldest First Unregistered On Registered On Add a comment

I'm not at all shocked that former incompetent book clerk, Paul Constant, was also a former incompetent Sears clerk. That corporation has a solid history of stealing other people's patents --- they deserved to go out of business long, long ago (and that's not even counting the sorry job their auto side did.

Posted by sgt_doom on December 27, 2011 at 11:19 AM

Get to work and study this, Paulie:

http://www.pdf-archive.com/2011/10/26/an…

Posted by sgt_doom on December 27, 2011 at 11:19 AM

Our dear Paul's sluttish work ethic notwithstanding, I will truly miss both Sears and KMart if they go under. Not only are they superior stores to Wal-Mart and Macy's, they often have better prices.

Plus, as we have seen time and again, the less competition Wal-Mart has, the more anti-consumer they get.

I'm glad I'm old and really don't need to buy anything. Shopping is increasingly dismal.

Posted by Catalina Vel-DuRay

on December 27, 2011 at 11:21 AM

Sears has been on a long, sad, downward spiral for some time now. I think if they could have weathered the bad times, consumer culture might have shifted in the next few years back to something that values name brands, service, repair, expertise, etc. Unfortunately where they're at now, I'd rather deal with the phone company than have another experience with Sears' customer service as fucked up as my last one.

That said, here's hoping that with this news, I've got another shot at a discounted Smeg floor model.

Posted by Dougsf on December 27, 2011 at 12:20 PM

My friend Brian in Portland scored a gigantic refrigerator at Sears last year. It started off at $700, but he got a discount because it was a floor model. Then they had a $100 off sale, then he got back like $120 because of Portlands 'green energy' rebates, so actual cost was $400. And this is a mega fridge...we had to take the doors off to fit it through his front door!

Posted by Supreme Ruler Of The Universe

on December 27, 2011 at 12:49 PM

There are still K-Marts around? Remember this little tidbit from years ago?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDKVLyRt0…

Crank it on your stero!!!

Posted by Cato the Younger Younger on December 27, 2011 at 12:55 PM

120 out of 4000 stores. That's hardly a doom and gloom story.

Posted by SPG on December 27, 2011 at 12:56 PM

Foist is a word that one does not hear (or read)
often enough.

Posted by M. Wells on December 27, 2011 at 12:59 PM

Sears is run more as an investment vehicle than a department store. Most of the free cash get diverted.

Posted by ryanmm on December 27, 2011 at 2:11 PM

This is actually good news. There was an abnormal and out of whack explosion of retailers during the last 20 years, based on the false economy - people buying things they didn't need with money they didn't have in the form of credit they didn't deserve. We should not want to, and hopefully won't ever go back to that. And believing that, there must then be a downsizing of the retail sector. Let's hope.

Posted by Meinert on December 27, 2011 at 2:40 PM

I fail to see how you think this would reflect well on the quality of your workmanship, then or now.

Posted by TJ on December 27, 2011 at 3:21 PM

Ah ha! I always wondered where Paul Constant honed his incisive business acumen, on display so much today when he tells Amazon all the mistakes they're making. Folding jeans at Sears! Of course. Jeff Bezos is a fool for ignoring this man. A fool.

Posted by Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn

on December 27, 2011 at 5:04 PM

Jesus Christ Paul, evolve already.

Posted by GlamB0t on December 27, 2011 at 6:10 PM

The thing about Sears is that they actually sell better-than-average appliances, which they deliver and subsequently service. Not to mention well-regarded stuff like Craftsman tools. I purchased my last mattress there (on-line). But its true, the rare times when I go into the Aurora Village store its like a ghost town, and inventory is spread way out to make it look fuller than it is. As mentioned above, there's some skanky financial machinations going on with its current owner which have zero to do with selling decent products in decent stores.

Posted by MarkyMark on December 27, 2011 at 11:08 PM

Retail stores need to keep up with the times. Kmart stores are disgusting, dingy and dirty places that are unpleasant to shop. (At least around here) Sears locations are at least clean, but seem to be holding on to a 1970's business model. Like the U.S. Post Office, retail needs to face, and adapt to the reality of the technology of the 21st century. Wishing things were like they were 40 years ago isn't going to help them survive.

Posted by Rob in Baltimore

on December 28, 2011 at 6:57 AM

We must FIGHT for the right of EVERY worker to be as lazy as Paul was when he worked for Sears!!

OCCUPY THE BREAK ROOM!! We are the 99% of people who don't give a shit about our jobs!

Posted by Chris in Vancouver WA on December 28, 2011 at 7:43 AM