Failures by major retail outlets are adding up so quickly that its become hard to keep track, let alone distinguish whether one has more meaning than another.
The bankruptcy filing of Sears is nonetheless a seminal moment in the fall from grace by the big department stores, and a very sad one as well.
Sears filing came Monday after it was unable to make a $134 million debt payment. The bankruptcy filing was no surprise. Sears Holdings, the parent company, gamely says it will keep profitable stores open in the chains of Sears and Kmart, which it also owns. But in the last eight months, Sears has shaved 30 percent of its outlets and 25 percent of its employees, with more to come.
About 700 outlets remain, but at least 200 are expected to disappear soon, and maybe more as the bankruptcy process moves forward.
President Trumps claim that Sears was mismanaged was a case of kicking a corporation when its down, and his comments were counter-productive and frankly tasteless. Industry analysts, though, are second-guessing Sears decisions to cut advertising and invest insufficiently in store upkeep, which compounded the problems posed by online shopping at stores such as Walmart, which are surviving the onslaught of Internet commerce.
Sears is a special case, if only in historic terms, because this was the company that redefined American shopping habits. Its been around for 132 years. It was known for generations by two names, Sears and Roebuck, and its massive catalog drew shoppers away from the smaller Main Street-type stories that had served America through the 19th Century and into the 20th.
For those who long for the day when small shops and family-run retail businesses could flourish, the fall of Sears a chain that helped malls overwhelm the retail landscape might seem like poetic justice. The giant that slayed the mom-and-pop operations is now a casualty of online purchasing and, to some industry experts, its own missteps.
The collapse of Sears empire, though, continues to cost thousands of jobs, along with lost tax revenue and the disappearance of one more choice to customers. Stores are vacant and their space wont be easy to fill. Bankruptcy is always a sad day in business, regardless of whether the company is large or small.
Sears says it will press on to survive in some form. It is hoping for a big Christmas season. Skeptics say other handwriting is on the wall.
Whatever happens, bankruptcy delivers a stomach punch to a piece of America that survived depressions, recessions and 20th Century technology change, but could not survive Amazon.
The Springfield (Mass.) Republican
