Sears Goes Bankrupt

After 126 years in business, Sears has gone under. This was both unexpected and completely expected. As a student of business, I have a soft spot for Sears. This was the Amazon of its day. The company invented modern retail. Sears catalogues were a regular part of American life for decades.

Sam: Cliff, you look terrible. Was today Sears catalogue day?

Cliff: And that’s not all, Spiegel’s catalogue came out the same day. Yeah, it’s a phenomenon that happens once every 27 years when both marketing strategies are in the same equinox.

Sears had the largest warehouses in the world and the largest building. So many innovations started at Sears: precision inventory control, Allstate, the Discover card, Dean Witter. Sears was a Dow component from 1924 to 1999.

Interestingly, Sears started as a mail-order watch business that eventually branched out into…well, everything. You could even buy a mail-order house.

Four years ago, Sears was going for $48 per share. Today it’s at 35 cents.

“How did you go bankrupt?”
“Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly.”

― The Sun Also Rises

Posted by on October 15th, 2018 at 11:19 am


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