Sears Canada (1952-2017)

[Amare]

Very interesting facts released today. Essentially there is a week until the doomsday announcement and Sears Canada begins to shutter stores for good, as it's highly unlikely Stranzl will be able to pull of his deal.

 

[Skeezix]

Very interesting facts released today. Essentially there is a week until the doomsday announcement and Sears Canada begins to shutter stores for good, as it's highly unlikely Stranzl will be able to pull of his deal.

Interesting Marina Strauss article in this morning’s Globe. The lenders are not yet sold on Stranzl’s bid, may never be, and believe there is more money to be be made liquidating the chain in the run up to the holiday season than there would be by waiting. Does not bode well for those hoping some form of Sears will emerge from the insolvency process.

 

[ShonTron]

Very interesting facts released today. Essentially there is a week until the doomsday announcement and Sears Canada begins to shutter stores for good, as it's highly unlikely Stranzl will be able to pull of his deal.

Aside from the 11 stores already announced?

 

[Skeezix]

Aside from the 11 stores already announced?

The entire chain would be liquidated.

 

[ShonTron]

The entire chain would be liquidated.

That's what I thought. At one point this week, there was a slight possibility of those 11 stores remaining under Stranzl’s bid, so I wanted to be sure.

 

[AlbertC]

'A complete joke': Laid-off Sears workers say hardship fund cash amounts to nothing after EI cut

'I'm disappointed, I'm angry, I'm frustrated over this whole situation,' former employee says

http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/business/sears-canada-employees-hardship-fund-1.4344334

 

[Skeezix]

What went wrong for Sears Canada: Experts weigh in
BNN, 6 Oct. 2016 (h/t Retail Insider)

Worth a read. I don't entirely agree with each of the experts interviewed for this piece - although each of them is dead-on-the-money with at least one point they make. For example, at least a couple of these experts claim that Sears Canada was late/too timid with e-commerce. But, of course, Sears.ca in the day had an unparalleled selection and customer experience in Canada, at a time when Amazon.ca was limited to books and DVDs, when Walmart and other American retailers had no Canadian e-commerce presence to speak of, and when Canadian retailers like Canadian Tire and Hudson's Bay were actually shuttering their online stores. Despite what David Zietsma claims in the piece linked above, Sears was initially fairly bold in its attempts to migrate its catalogue business online. The problem is that investment in Sears.ca, as with the chain as a whole, ground to a halt, and it withered like its bricks-and-mortar counterparts. Sears was neither late nor timid, at least initially, but Sears.ca had its legs cut out from under it.

In contrast, Jim Danahy, CEO, CustomerLab, probably has the best assessment of what went wrong:

“Nothing ‘went wrong’ because Sears’ demise was no accident. Some have called it a 10-year train wreck, but it was actually a deliberate, controlled dismemberment of the company since it was acquired by the current ownership group.”

“Management has acted consistently to siphon-off value by selling Sears in pieces rather than investing in the financial and human capital that HBC, Walmart and others were putting in to their operations to succeed.”

“Specifically, their pattern began immediately after the acquisition with share buy-backs rather than re-investment of profits into retail fundamentals, and it expanded to include the sell-off of the company’s most productive real estate assets and brands over the ensuing years.”

“What may be the most remarkable feature of this sad story is how skillfully the owners used lame turnaround promises to keep the vultures at bay, and the cadaver alive throughout a decade-long harvest of limbs and vital organs at premium prices. The current death rattles are little more than spooning out the remaining bits of marrow.”​

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

No surprises here - from CP24:

http://www.cp24.com/news/sears-cana...l-to-liquidate-all-remaining-stores-1.3626232

And the Star:

https://www.thestar.com/business/2017/10/10/sears-canada-going-out-of-business.html

AoD

 

[Skeezix]

Sad, disappointing, not what needed to happen ... but not surprising whatsoever.

 

[Skeezix]

Also, hard to believe "WTS - What the Sears?" didn't save the company.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Also, hard to believe "WTS - What the Sears?" didn't save the company.

The polished concrete floors and stripped down aesthetics (i.e. none) will probably save the next tenant from demolition costs - if there are any to be found.

AoD

 

[Tuscani01]

The polished concrete floors and stripped down aesthetics (i.e. none) will probably save the next tenant from demolition costs - if there are any to be found.

AoD

We're looking at full demo (See Sq. One Simons) for the remainder of the properties they own. They haven't put any money into the buildings and they need a lot of work. It will be easier to rebuild everything from scratch.

 

[jje1000]

Surprising and unsurprising- I thought more of the company would have been sold off rather than nearly the whole ship going down.

Regardless- lot of potential implications for malls around Canada. Some already went through the loss of Zellers/Target.

Edit: earlier Globe article on that (https://archive.fo/VuCnt)

 

[Admiral Beez]

They should have closed the whole thing down two years ago, paid off their creditors and then paid the rest to their employees. Instead they waited to pay out bonuses and mess with failed recovery plans.

Good thing HBC bought the Simpsons building on Queen.

 

[Skeezix]

They should have closed the whole thing down two years ago, paid off their creditors and then paid the rest to their employees. Instead they waited to pay out bonuses and mess with failed recovery plans.

Why would they have done that when Eddie Lampert was still funneling money out of the company?

Good thing HBC bought the Simpsons building on Queen.

Agreed, but what does that have to do with Sears?