Thread regarding Sears layoffs

I won't shop in stores that pester me to use their credit card, buy extended warranties ask for a lot of personal information, etc....plus have horrible after-purchase customer service. Thus, even though I bought thousands of dollars in appliances from Sears in the late 1990's and these things are needing replacement, I won't be buying at Sears again.

Here's what went on in one of the still-open (but until when?) Sears stores today:

An exceptional appliance saleswoman had an even better sales day than normal. She made the company and herself a nice amount of money in a relatively short amount of time. Yet she was called into the store manager's office and scolded for not having enough of those transactions on a Sears card, letting one of those customers spend $2,600 without signing up for the rewards program, and not having 100% of those sales include the PA (protection agreement, essentially an extended warranty).

She has a job offer she was thinking about, and this helped her make a decision, even though it means learning new products to sell, and making a little less money at first. Sears will not know until the day she just doesn't show up again.

The pressure for metrics numbers - which can't save a company - drives off good employees, as well as customers. Which means the corporate plan of creative destruction is working.

This exposes the fallacy in their idea of "shrinking to profitability". The best stores are still losing sales and profits at an incredible rate. There is no long term viable core at the heart of this mess. One of the stores near me on the closing list is a relatively new clean store in a busy strip mall, in a prosperous area with a huge amount of car traffic going by everyday. If they can't make it work there the company has no chance. It isn't a matter of size or the number of stores. SHC's retail strategies are just totally ridiculous.

I just love how they "preach" member first, take care of the members etc. But just when I start to take care of a member I get written up or yelled at because I was not stocking fast enough or I hadn't sold any plans or signed anyone up for a credit card or warrenty plan. I am so sick of meetings where the DM and store manager say one thing and then in practice we are suppose to do another. We had 9 people quit last week because of the dual personality policy, it was and is driving everyone crazy. I guess take care of members means to extract as much information from them so the company can sell it to third parties to try to stay afloat.

How true! The beatdown sessions before we open each day focus on the meaningless metrics, but rarely mention getting out and selling something ($$$) or great customer service. Good service, not a stupid rewards program, is what will bring them back.