Opening Insights: An Empire
...Once a pioneer to the department store industry, Sears struggled in a quickly shifting retail environment, battered by competition from big-box stores and then by the meteoric rise of Amazon and other e-commerce players.
Sears Holdings Corporation, also the parent company for Kmart, which merged with Sears in 2005, now has 687 stores remaining, including Kmart locations.
The company been drowning in debt exceeding $5 billion and could not make a $134 million payment that had been due on Monday.
The company began as a mail order catalogue in the 1880s, featuring items from bicycles to sewing machines to houses.
It began opening retail locations in 1925 and expanded swiftly in suburban malls from the 1950s to 1970s.
But the onset of discounters like Walmart created challenges for Sears that have only grown and it faced even more competition from online sellers and appliance retailers like Lowe's and Home Depot.
The operator of Sears and Kmart stores began to incur massive losses, joining a growing list of retailers that have filed for bankruptcy or liquidated in the last few years - since Amazon began aggressively competing with stores by offering goods far cheaper online.
Source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/what-a-kmart-manager-did-after-his-store-closed-forever/ar-BBOAQ9R?ocid=spartandhp
Sears was a household name. It was an organization that became an empire. It provided careers, jobs and resources to the people and the economy, it was essential to commerce. Did it have its challenges? Sure, what company doesn't today. Many may have thought, it was too big to fail. The question is, why didn't anyone care to save it?
Why do empires fall: because of the people or because of the money; or because we get the two mixed up and we get greed.
Informational Insights: The End of An ERA
PETER DRUCKER
A manager at a Kmart in Pennsylvania went the extra mile when announcing to shoppers his store was closing for the last time.
Video footage shows Joshua Englert, 34, a Kmart employee of 18 years, holding back tears as he thanks loyal customers and his colleagues for 'working together to get through the stressful times'.
Mr Englert's Kmart in McMurray, south of Pittsburgh, is one of dozens forced to close after its parent company Sears filed for bankruptcy on Monday with several billions of dollars in debts.
Mr Englert posted the video of his final goodbye to his store on his Facebook, where it has since been seen by more than 47,000 people.
'Attention Kmart shoppers, your McMurray Kmart will be closing for the last time in just five minutes.
'I wanted to take this opportunity not to sell you 40 cent plaid skirts or five cent panties, but instead thank you for supporting a lifetime of memories.
'Sincere thank you to the people who have made this store their second homes. I have worked for Kmart for 18 years, more than half my life. I am the man I am today because of the people that I have met here at Kmart.
'The retail environment - it's pretty stressful - but we've always worked together to get through those stressful times: the inventories, the Black Fridays, the long lines for Tickle Me Elmos and PlayStation 4s, when we only had three of them.
'Thank you deeply to the Kmart McMurray team, you guys have made it all worthwhile. Once again, the time is 4.25, your McMurray Kmart will be closing at 4.30, thank you.'Source: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/what-a-kmart-manager-did-after-his-store-closed-forever/ar-BBOAQ9R?ocid=spartandhp
We are seeing the death of retain and industry... what will be do? Will we watch it crumble, will be talk about it crumbling, or will we do something?
Possibilities for Consideration: A Co-Lab™ Approach
The Co-Lab™ enables
the freedom to have open-thought.
The Co-Lab™ architecture provides
an environment and structure to
convert open-thought
to
constructive thought.
DR. RICHARD JORGENSEN
- What if Sears could have been saved?
- What if heritage was something to be respected and honored instead of torn down?
- What if the wisdom of yesterday could be integrated and transferred to today's generation?
- What if you could be a part of a solution to unite and support people in developing collective and individual sentience?
Add Your Insight: Be the Change...
“Love should be treated like a business deal,
but every business deal has its own terms and its own currency.
And in love, the currency is virtue.
You love people not for what you do for them or what they do for you.
You love them for the values, the virtues,
which they have achieved in their own character.”
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