I have the most wonderful memories of looking through the Sears catalog as a kid!!! That being said, I probably haven’t actually shopped at a Sears since then. Most of our winter coats come from Land’s End (online), though, in case that counts for something.
The last time I was at Sears, I walked the whole second floor and could not find a single clerk. I could easily shoplift if there is anything worthwhile.
Their Kenmore washer and dryer still go strong after 20+ years. Our repair person recommends to keep them as long as we can. The new ones may have the same name but are manufactured by different companies.
I wandered through the Lands End section at the mall store last December, but didn’t buy anything. It closed.
The standalone store in my suburban city closed a year ago. The place was a dump. The last time I was there was several years ago, looking for some tool or other. Escalators didn’t work and the place just smelled.
A few weeks ago it was being used to train fire fighters. Demolition will happen soonish and the area will be redeveloped into housing, I think.
Ohh. Several years ago DH bought a Craftsman lawnmower at Sears. A few years later, it needed a repair so he took it to a Sears service center. After not hearing anything for a while he called to find out the status of the repair. After holds, and waits, and redirects he was told to come get a voucher for its value to buy a new mower. No explanation. No idea what they did with his mower, but he did go in and get a voucher, and it was for the full value of the mower.
So we did some research on current mowers and went to Sears and picked one out, which cost quite a bit more than the value of the voucher. We went to the register to pay, and the employee couldn’t figure out how to ring up the mower and the voucher. He called a supervisor, the button he needed to press on the register didn’t work. Called another employee. No one could figure out how to sell us this mower. I explored the entire store while DH stood there at the register, with three confused employees trying to figure out what to do. It probably took 30 min. Finally they gave him a receipt, without charging him anything, and told him to go to the pickup area to get the mower. We couldn’t believe our luck, and picked up the mower and got out of there. It was a positive customer service experience that still convinced us that we should never shop at Sears again.
The only time I’ve been to Sears since is to return something purchased at Lands End.
Purchased a washer there two years ago. Arrived not working. HORRIBLE customer service when I called 10x to get some help to replace it. The manager at the store did not want to help. Ended up going to the delivering company who switched it out for us. I actually thought they deserve to go out of business.
Did LOVE the Wish Book and growing up in Maine with little or no other stores that Christmas catalog was a lifesaver as a kid!
Former retail employee. It’s very very common for a store to close a store credit card if it hasn’t been used in a couple of years. I think I’ve worked at 4 different department store and that was the case at every store I worked at. Once a card has been closed, it can’t be reopened. You would have to reapply.
So if you want to keep a card in use, make a purchase every year or so. I have a BP Oil card that I’ve had for 30 years and it helps the history of your credit. I make a purchase every other month just to keep it open.
Also it is not the store clerks fault if your card has been closed, they have no control over it. But they are graded by how many credit accounts they open, which is a really big reason why I no longer work a retail job. It has become a hard, very pushy job.
We bought an oven & warming drawer at Sears 3-4 years ago. The warming drawer had issues and it was a PIA to get it replaced … incompetence both on the phone and in the store. Finally got it done, but took Sears off my list of places to buy appliances.
Our local store closed last year.
I do have fond memories of dog-earing pages of the Sears Catalog back in the day as my Christmas wish list.
DH said he bought a few shirts there recently. He likes the shirts but said the sales clerk was snarky.
Never shopped in Sears, ever.
The store in my area closed several years ago. It’s now a Whole Foods in what was part of the store and empty in the rest, afaik.
The last time I shopped at Sears regularly was in the late '90s when I had little kids. I could usually find decent, reasonably priced clothes for them there.
I had been going in and out of our local Sears very frequently over the past few years because I discovered Land’s End was sold in-store. I was late finding LE but my whole family loved the quality! Then sadly our local store went out of business about 6 months ago. No more in-store LE shopping for us. But honestly I can’t even recall the last time I made an actual Sears purchase.
So when the store was closing my elderly mom (in her 80’s) purchased 4 bras ‘final sale’. When she got home she realized one of the bras was totally the wrong size than the other 3. So I went back with her to kindly ask if she could exchange the one for the correct size. Tickets on, receipt in hand. WOW, were they rude to her, I mean REALLY rude, and no, they would not let her exchange the one bra. Understandable it was final sale, but really?? No need to be such jerks about an obvious honest mistake made by a little old lady.
Sears has been off our radar for a very long time.
We bought our appliances at a local store in town. Any tools we picked up at Home Depot.
Sears was EVERYTHING when I was a kid. The catalog was amazing. I would thumb through it and pine for toys I wanted. Sears was the big department store in the town I grew up in, and anyone in the county who wanted to buy anything drove into town to Sears. Shoes? Sears. Jeans? Sears. Everything. Sears.
RIP!
I will miss them for Lands End returns. In fact, it will probably curb the amount I purchase from Lands End in the future.
When we lived on a military base in Germany in the early 70s, we relied heavily on the Sears catalog for clothes and holiday gifts
My dad has had Craftsman tools my entire life.
One of my sisters is an accountant for the part of Sears that sells appliances to contractors and developers. Supposedly it’s the only profitable part left, in part because they pay ridiculously low salaries. Nevertheless, if they close her division, her family will be in a world of hurt. There are not many places in her city that employ accountants. So, we’ve been watching this unfurl with concern.
I’ve purchased many appliances from Sears over the years, and when my kids were little, many clothes for them came from Sears. We have a home warranty through them now. They told me it would be good even if the stores didn’t exist any longe, but we shall see.
When I was growing up in Memphis in the 60s and 70s, our family spent a lot of time at the Sears Crosstown store downtown. I have fond memories of our weekly Saturday morning trips there, when my sister and I used to each get a quarter to buy candy at the candy counter. My dad would always be looking at tools or lawnmowers and my mom, my sister and I would spend time browsing the clothes sections. In particular, I remember the Lemon Frog shop for teen girls, with its groovy bellbottoms and coordinated pantsuits. Our refrigerator, washer and dryer, and oven were all Kenmore appliances.
Besides containing a department store on its lower floors, the art-deco high-rise building was also a major catalog distribution center and thrived for over 60 years until it was closed in the early 90s. The building sat empty for several years and was almost torn down, but was finally put on the National Historic Register in 2013. It’s now been completely renovated on the inside and turned into a mixed-use development called Crosstown Concourse that opened last year. It contains apartments, restaurants, stores, a health center and even a school! I’m so happy that a place that I spent so much time in as a child is still there and has become an exciting hub of activity once again, even if the inside of it doesn’t resemble the Sears store that I once knew and loved.
I still have a lovely dress (which I bought to wear at a wedding and still wear regularly), and D has a shirt she likes that we bought from Sears within the past decade. I believe H has some undershirts we bought him from there as well. It has been increasingly difficult to find a salesclerk and transact business at Sears, which is unfortunate.
Sears has been hanging by a thread for so long. I remember when they acquired Kmart and that was supposed to save the company.
All of our hand tools are Craftsman. Stove, washer and dryer are Kenmore.
My kids wore uniforms from lands end so we’d go to sears to get them. For some reason their service department handles our washer dryer though I don’t think we bought them there. They’re Samsung. They tried to sell us a whole house repair contract but they didn’t cover our brand of stove, dishwasher, oven or refrigerator so it made no sense.
Who else remembers the scandal of the sears model showing his business in the underwear? I used to love that catalog. I bought my first non hand me down/homemade dress there when I was a little girl and I’ll never forget the experience of buying something all my own. I took my class pictures in it.
@Mom2jl LEMON FROG!
Wow, have not thought of that brand name in 40 years!!