By way of the highway c/o of no return.Stores like K-Mart are dropping out of sight,fast.Radio Shack is all but finished. Blockbuster is practically extinct except in Alaska. Borders book store gone. F*A*O* Schwarz ,The best toy store imaginable,no Christmas should be w/o at least a look inside one of their Norman Rockwell inspired settings ... window-shopping. Circuit City {a favorite of mine}... Closed-up Some are suggesting that Macy's is ready for the chopping block. Brooks Bros. { a great place for quality Men and Women's clothing } was the standard for years among well dressed gents and Executives. There are around 2oo Brooks Bros. stores in the U.S. Bergdorf Goodman { founded in 1899 } still has 2 stores in New York city. Maybe a thinning out of Retail giants " It's a good thing ". I doubt Martha Stewart would use those same words in regards to K-Mart. What Say You ?
Sears and Roebuck stores use to have the best American made brands of appliances and tools. Craftsman and Kenmore were built to last with quality materials. Once the corporate elites got hold of all American products and materials and brought in China parts it was over for quality and just the beginning for junk that last not even 75% as long as the past materials and parts. My friend had a Kenmore washer and dryer set she bought in 1967 and was still using the same ones with teenagers washing jeans and shoes all the time in 1985. She sold them still in good condition and bought a new set that didn't last 10 years.Now they don't last 5 years.
I can see easily why the Internet and Amazon are scoring so BiG and so Easily.Take Hi-Fi equipment.There are literally no more H-Fi stores save Best Buys.Which is why I liked Circuit city so much. Best Buys carries only low end H-Fi equipment. Now if one wants to get into being an Audiophile there are Internet web sites where you can pick out great equipment costing thousands of dollar and pay No Sales tax.Plus shipping is almost always free even for LP's and CD over any $ 49 purchase. So in many cases you can order something and get it within a a day or 2 or three { If UPS vs. FedEx }. That is a huge Win-Win. But still it was nice to go into a good Hi-Fi store and look and listen to nice equipment. You can do that with stereo equipment but not so easily with clothes.Or a major purchase like a Car or fine jewelry { watch,diamonds}.
Americans want convenience and speed without having to see the rest of America....thus the growth of online sales and Amazon. Shortly Amazon will get to the "Same Day" threshold and the end of brick and mortar is here for all but pure specialty stores and experience.
So then Actual SHOPPING is now to be considered as some sort of Dinosaur.That is as Unamerican as Apple Pie coming out of some vending machine.I suppose a Walk in the Park like the movie of the same name - Barefoot in the Park - { 1967 } starring Robert Redford and Jane Fonda { still very much alive and well } is no longer of any importance, much like physical shopping. Or soon { if Liberals and leftists alike } have their way and High speed rail\ and auto-drive cars are the new IN THING. When are we gonna around to Fast Fishing and Fast Dining as if Fast Food.
My local sears is in a ghetto. The only reason to go there would be an object lesson to your kids of what not to do in life.
exactly corporate American is about making more profits then the year before, not just being profitable that means they have to sell things that do not last as long, pay employees less, import, ect... ect.... being profitable, treating employees fairly, treating customers fairly do not TRUMP increasing profits year over year.... just being profitable is not enough in today's world if you sell a washer and dryer that last 50 years, that is bad for business as you will not sell them a new one in 5 to 10 years
Younger Americans no longer demand quality but want cheap crap made in third world countries. Then there's the millennial factor. Millennials are completely clueless what quality is and they refuse to enter a business that doesn't have numerous safe spaces in the building.
liberals and leftists are to be blamed for progress. There you have it. Progress comes from progressives. Hey, what a coincidence! I do fast fishing at the grocery store. Catch one every time! Fast food has been around for over 60 years. But it won't long before the horse and buggy are a thing of the past. Before long, toilets will be IN THE HOUSE! Can you imagine?!?! And the evolution of the telegraph is putting runners right out of business. As for a walk in the park, you had better hope a liberal protects that park. Trump wants to allow building in National Parks.
The quality of Sears dropped when they had to compete with foreign producers. If consumers didn't buy cheaper products from China et al, there wouldn't be a problem. Beyond that, you can still get quality products. Sears just didn't keep up. You can still get premium tools from places like Snap-On or Proto, but you pay premium prices. Same for appliances. You get what you pay for. I bought an electronics meter [volts, amps, resistance, frequency, etc] from Sears in an emergency one day. Some of the functions never have worked. But it cost about 1/5 the price of a nominal grade Fluke meter. Shopping online? That beats the hell out of fighting crowds. I especially like doing my christmas shopping from my couch. Doing the stores and malls was always such an ordeal.
If this is your take on why places like Sears and K-Mart are closing where the cheapest of goods from a - Dollar General - Store are on the uptake may seem credible.Because the Middle Class is dwindling { under Obama } and the Upper class and Lower class are expanding. That is why places like - Dollar General - is popular. Plus why stores like Neiman Marcus have tennis shoes { many styles } that sell upwards of $ 1,ooo and up.Granted most of those super expensive tennis shoes are bought by professional athletes. But Sears was home to Middle America.It's fading and the new era of Millennials are being weaned on either Cheap or expensive. There has to be a Middle ground.Extremes result in extremes of behavior.Which may have been the motivation in 2012 for Obama to purposedly court the youth { and college kids } and forgo the Hard-Hat whites of the middle class and seniors. Obama chose the Rich { top 1 % and wealthy white professionals } and the Lower class or those still too young to be in any class.
Really? I doubt that this is true. Specifically the "without having to see the rest of America" part. Do you subscribe to that? Are you afraid somehow? Or do you suppose that it's just folks you know who might maintain that sense of selfish introspect? Perhaps I misconstrue what you're intending to say here, so feel free to clarify.
yea it's all Obamas fault!!! this has been going on for years and a sped up after collapse of 2008 and nafta, where corporations chased profits instead of quality, industry was taken over by the bean counters
Bean counters are how a company keeps the door open. You all act like profit doesn't matter. There has never been a time when industry wasn't run by bean counters.
most companies in the past were led by technical types, engineers, the bean counters were their but never ran the company and were never focused on innovation , the automotive companies for one , I had spoken to Dr Deming , (the father of quality here and japan) back in the 80's and he saw what was happening to industry because of the MBA's taking over
Do you seriously think Sears' problem is that they lost customers to Neiman Marcus? Have you heard of Walmart? And, Obama's major achievement, health care, did little for the wealthy while achieving coverage for millions of those who could not afford it. Two fails in one post - I don't know how you got this so backwards.
