Future of Sears Canada looks grim, posts $144-million loss
- Thread starter spaminator
- Start date
The Bay and Sears are tied together at the hip. The Dollar Store will become the center for most Canadians, the Bay and others will jack their prices so only the elite can shop there.
Good on you Vb. Nice to see someone has been paying attention.....
How Lampert set Sears Up To Fail
How Eddie Lampert set Sears up to fail - Business Insider
How Sears CEO Lampert cashes in as stores cash out
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2017/03/22/sears-holdings-ceo-eddie-lampert/99487518/
Once upon a time, hedge fund manager Eddie Lampert was living a Wall Street fairy tale.
For a while, it seemed to work like a charm. Pundits called him the “Steve Jobs of the investment world.” The new Warren Buffett. By 2006 he was flying high, the richest man in Connecticut, managing over $15 billion thorough his hedge fund, ESL Investments.
Stoked by his Wall Street success, Lampert plunged headlong into the retail world. Undaunted by his lack of industry experience and hailed a genius, Lampert boldly pushed to merge Kmart and Sears with a layoff and cost-cutting strategy that would, he promised, send profits into the stratosphere. .
Fast-forward to 2013: The fairy tale has become a nightmare.
Lampert is now known as one of the worst CEOs in America — the man who flushed Sears down the toilet with his demented management style and harebrained approach to retail. Sears stock is tanking. His hedge fun is down 40 percent, and the business press has turned from praising Lampert’s genius towatching gleefully as his ship sinks. Investors are running from “Crazy Eddie” like the plague.
Crazy Eddie has been one of America’s most vocal advocates of discredited free-market economics, so obsessed with Ayn Rand he could rattle off memorized passages of her novels. As Mina Kimes explained in a fascinating profile in Bloomberg Businessweek, Lampert took the myth that humans perform best when acting selfishly as gospel, pitting Sears company managers against each other in a kind of Lord of the Flies death match.
This, he believed, would cause them to act rationally and boost performance.
If you think that sounds batshit crazy, congratulations.
Instead of enhancing Sears’ bottom line, the heads of various divisions began to undermine each other and fight tooth and claw for the profits of their individual fiefdoms at the expense of the overall brand. By this time Crazy Eddie was completely in thrall to his own bloated ego, and fancied he could bend underlings to his will by putting them through humiliating rituals, like annual conference calls in which unit managers were forced to bow and scrape for money and resources. But the chaos only grew.
Lampert took to hiding behind a pen name and spying on and goading employees through an internal social network. He became obsessed with technology, wasting resources on developing apps as Sears’ physical stores became dilapidated and filthy. Instead of investing in workers and developing useful products, he sold off valuable real estate, shuttered stores, and engineered stock buybacks in order to manipulate stock prices and line his own pockets.
Eddie’s crazy didn’t stop there. As a Wall Street creature fantastically out of touch with the kind of ordinary folks who shop at Sears, he inserted his love of luxury into the mix, trying to sell Rolex watches and $4,400 designer handbagsthrough America’s iconic budget-friendly brand.
As his company was descending into Randian mayhem, Lampert continued to cheerfully inform stockholders that his revolutionary ideas would soon produce earth-shattering results.
Reality: Sears has lost half its value in five years.
Since 2010, Sears has closed more than half of its stores. Sears Holdings is financially distressed and Lampert’s own hedge fund has reduced its stake in the company. The Sears store in Oakland, California, open for business with boarded-up windows, has even been cited for urban blight.
Truth be told, hedge fund honchos have had little to fear from royally screwing companies. Bank accounts fattened at the expense of workers and other stakeholders, they go on their merry way to mess up something else.
While Lampert was caught up in Randian delusions of crass materialism and cut-throat capitalism, he failed to realize that a business is an experience as much communal as it is individual. Employees are not just competitive beings — they benefit from cooperating with each other and perform better when they are respected, rather than beaten down and driven by fear.
Lampert created a business model predicated on the notion that the invisible hand of the market would magically drive stellar results. With his belief in economic fairy tales, he managed to kill the goose that laid his own golden egg.
http://www.salon.com/2013/12/10/ayn_rand_loving_ceo_destroys_his_empire_partner/
The executive chairman of Sears Canada has stepped down in order to head up a bid to buy the company.
According to an employee memo obtained by CBC News, Brandon Stranzl will step away from his day-to-day operations at the company to instead focus on putting together a bid to buy the company and keep it going once it emerges from its current restructuring.
"In light of the approaching bid deadline and the focus required to assemble all necessary components of a bid, the board thought it was best for Brandon to focus exclusively on putting the bid together and step away from the day-to-day operations," said the memo, signed by Graham Savage, chair of the board of director's special committee while it restructures.
As part of those CCAA proceedings, there's an upcoming deadline of Aug. 31 for parties interested in buying any or all of the company's assets to step forward.
Stranzl had been focusing his efforts on finding a turnaround plan for the company after that process ends, and "the intention is to formulate these plans into a bid that can be submitted," the memo reads. "The goal of any such proposal is to facilitate a path for Sears Canada to emerge from CCAA and so that all of us can continue with the company's reinvention plans."
This week, the company agreed to create a so-called hardship fund for employees who were denied severance payments when they lost their jobs with the retailer.
The $500,000 fund will come out of money that had been set aside to pay bonuses under a key employee retention plan.
A lawyer who represents current and former employees says the creation has the support of both the company and a court-appointed monitor in its restructuring.
Susan Ursel says it's designed to "assist people in situations of precarious hardship."
The hardship fund requires approval by the court overseeing Sears restructuring at a hearing set for Friday
Sears Canada chairman steps down so he can bid to buy retailer - Business - CBC News
According to an employee memo obtained by CBC News, Brandon Stranzl will step away from his day-to-day operations at the company to instead focus on putting together a bid to buy the company and keep it going once it emerges from its current restructuring.
"In light of the approaching bid deadline and the focus required to assemble all necessary components of a bid, the board thought it was best for Brandon to focus exclusively on putting the bid together and step away from the day-to-day operations," said the memo, signed by Graham Savage, chair of the board of director's special committee while it restructures.
As part of those CCAA proceedings, there's an upcoming deadline of Aug. 31 for parties interested in buying any or all of the company's assets to step forward.
Stranzl had been focusing his efforts on finding a turnaround plan for the company after that process ends, and "the intention is to formulate these plans into a bid that can be submitted," the memo reads. "The goal of any such proposal is to facilitate a path for Sears Canada to emerge from CCAA and so that all of us can continue with the company's reinvention plans."
This week, the company agreed to create a so-called hardship fund for employees who were denied severance payments when they lost their jobs with the retailer.
The $500,000 fund will come out of money that had been set aside to pay bonuses under a key employee retention plan.
A lawyer who represents current and former employees says the creation has the support of both the company and a court-appointed monitor in its restructuring.
Susan Ursel says it's designed to "assist people in situations of precarious hardship."
The hardship fund requires approval by the court overseeing Sears restructuring at a hearing set for Friday
Sears Canada chairman steps down so he can bid to buy retailer - Business - CBC News
Group of Sears Canada creditors wants to sue executives and board
Mary Gazze, THE CANADIAN PRESS
First posted: Friday, August 18, 2017 09:59 AM EDT | Updated: Friday, August 18, 2017 09:02 PM EDT
TORONTO - A Toronto judge approved a hardship fund on Friday for former Sears Canada employees that will come from a pool of money set aside to pay bonuses for executives.
The $500,000 fund will help former employees facing difficulty who would have otherwise been eligible for severance payments when they lost their jobs at the retailer.
Employees will have to apply to receive money from the fund and prove that they face “urgent or immediate hardship” in their financial situation. They can receive up to eight weeks pay to a maximum of $12,000.
About 3,100 Sears employees have been laid off since the once-popular retailer began a restructuring process.
The department store chain has come under fire for forgoing retirement benefits or severance pay for former employees, while paying $9.2 million in bonuses to keep key employees on board while under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act.
A group of laid off Sears employees in court for the hardship fund proceedings Friday said they were happy the fund was created, but added even more money should have been made available to help all employees, not just those deemed to be in the greatest need.
“It’s still not what really they should’ve done,” said Vera Asselin, who worked in inventory management at Sears Canada’s head office.
“It should’ve been a proper severance where everyone had enough time to deal with the situation and carry on until they were able to find their own replacement work.”
The court has not yet heard a motion filed by a group of creditors that wants to sue the company’s executive officers and directors, alleging negligent misrepresentation and oppression. The claims have not been proven in court.
The retailer’s court-appointed monitor says the group wants an Ontario judge’s permission to launch their case against the company. The next hearing is scheduled for Tuesday.
In a report prepared ahead of Friday’s court hearing, the monitor said it has advised the creditor group that it believes such motions should be delayed.
However, it said the creditor group will ask the court to schedule a time to hear their claim.
The retailer announced a plan in June to close 59 locations across the country. It plans to finish liquidation sales by Oct. 12 and hopes to complete its restructuring this year.
Once a go-to for shoppers, Sears Canada has struggled in recent years despite efforts to change along with the shifting retail landscape.
The company has also dealt with several changes in executive leadership over the last four years.
Group of Sears Canada creditors wants to sue executives and board | Toronto & GT
Mary Gazze, THE CANADIAN PRESS
First posted: Friday, August 18, 2017 09:59 AM EDT | Updated: Friday, August 18, 2017 09:02 PM EDT
TORONTO - A Toronto judge approved a hardship fund on Friday for former Sears Canada employees that will come from a pool of money set aside to pay bonuses for executives.
The $500,000 fund will help former employees facing difficulty who would have otherwise been eligible for severance payments when they lost their jobs at the retailer.
Employees will have to apply to receive money from the fund and prove that they face “urgent or immediate hardship” in their financial situation. They can receive up to eight weeks pay to a maximum of $12,000.
About 3,100 Sears employees have been laid off since the once-popular retailer began a restructuring process.
The department store chain has come under fire for forgoing retirement benefits or severance pay for former employees, while paying $9.2 million in bonuses to keep key employees on board while under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act.
A group of laid off Sears employees in court for the hardship fund proceedings Friday said they were happy the fund was created, but added even more money should have been made available to help all employees, not just those deemed to be in the greatest need.
“It’s still not what really they should’ve done,” said Vera Asselin, who worked in inventory management at Sears Canada’s head office.
“It should’ve been a proper severance where everyone had enough time to deal with the situation and carry on until they were able to find their own replacement work.”
The court has not yet heard a motion filed by a group of creditors that wants to sue the company’s executive officers and directors, alleging negligent misrepresentation and oppression. The claims have not been proven in court.
The retailer’s court-appointed monitor says the group wants an Ontario judge’s permission to launch their case against the company. The next hearing is scheduled for Tuesday.
In a report prepared ahead of Friday’s court hearing, the monitor said it has advised the creditor group that it believes such motions should be delayed.
However, it said the creditor group will ask the court to schedule a time to hear their claim.
The retailer announced a plan in June to close 59 locations across the country. It plans to finish liquidation sales by Oct. 12 and hopes to complete its restructuring this year.
Once a go-to for shoppers, Sears Canada has struggled in recent years despite efforts to change along with the shifting retail landscape.
The company has also dealt with several changes in executive leadership over the last four years.
Group of Sears Canada creditors wants to sue executives and board | Toronto & GT
Sears Canada could face liquidation as soon as mid-Oct.
Armina Ligaya, THE CANADIAN PRESS
First posted: Wednesday, October 04, 2017 06:58 PM EDT | Updated: Wednesday, October 04, 2017 07:04 PM EDT
TORONTO — Sears Canada has just over a week to assess another revised bid from a buyer group led by its executive chairman as its lenders press for liquidation of the embattled retailer that could start as early as mid-October.
Orestes Pasparakis, a lawyer for the insolvent retailer’s court-appointed monitor FTI Consulting Canada, told the court it is assessing a revised bid from a group led by Brandon Stranzl that was submitted late Tuesday, but Sears Canada is running out of liquidity and time to decide which route to take.
“We are nearing the end of the road... We have pushed the timelines to preserve optionality, and quickly running out of money,” he told Justice Glenn Hainey on Wednesday.
Justice Hainey extended Sears Canada’s creditor protection, which was slated to end Wednesday, until Nov. 7.
However, a group of lenders who have provided debtor-in-possession financing to Sears Canada to help keep its stores open are pushing for a liquidation agreement to be approved by the court during a hearing on Oct. 13, or risk a default.
According to an amendment to an agreement with lenders submitted Tuesday, the retailer must sign a liquidation agreement by Oct. 7 — revised bid notwithstanding.
A process to then liquidate the remaining Sears locations could start as soon as Oct. 19.
“There is a massive swing in value,” if the process is not started by then, Joe Latham, a lawyer for Wells Fargo Capital Finance Corp. Canada, told the court.
If a proposal to buy the business as a going concern does not materialize, he added, it is key to liquidate before athe Christmas season is over to maximize the value the process can attain.
This comes after the court-appointed monitor said in a report earlier this week that Sears Canada is losing money on a weekly basis but will have enough liquidity to fund its operations until Nov. 7.
“We have a very short fuse on a potential liquidation of the company,” said Jeremy Dacks, a lawyer representing Sears from law firm Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP. “We do have a going concern bid that has issues that still need to be resolved and a matter of days, not weeks, to proceed.”
On Wednesday, Justice Hainey gave the green light for the sale of 12 Sears stores and its wholly-owned subsidiary and appliance retail chain Corbeil. The judge also approved the sale of a Sears distribution centre to Indigo Books and Music, as well as the sale of three home services businesses.
A proposal to sell the Viking appliance brand to Canadian Tire, however, was adjourned on Wednesday, as another party has the first right of refusal.
Mark Zigler, a lawyer with Koskie Minsky representing thousands of pensioners, said a decision must be made between the two paths before Sears Canada as soon as possible. He said they are not opposed to a proposal to buy the company as a going concern, but the delays in the process leaves pensioners “bearing the brunt” of the cost.
“The pensioners are paying the price,” he said.
“We cannot continue to be funding this exercise.”
Sears Canada could face liquidation as soon as mid-Oct. | Money | Toronto Sun
Armina Ligaya, THE CANADIAN PRESS
First posted: Wednesday, October 04, 2017 06:58 PM EDT | Updated: Wednesday, October 04, 2017 07:04 PM EDT
TORONTO — Sears Canada has just over a week to assess another revised bid from a buyer group led by its executive chairman as its lenders press for liquidation of the embattled retailer that could start as early as mid-October.
Orestes Pasparakis, a lawyer for the insolvent retailer’s court-appointed monitor FTI Consulting Canada, told the court it is assessing a revised bid from a group led by Brandon Stranzl that was submitted late Tuesday, but Sears Canada is running out of liquidity and time to decide which route to take.
“We are nearing the end of the road... We have pushed the timelines to preserve optionality, and quickly running out of money,” he told Justice Glenn Hainey on Wednesday.
Justice Hainey extended Sears Canada’s creditor protection, which was slated to end Wednesday, until Nov. 7.
However, a group of lenders who have provided debtor-in-possession financing to Sears Canada to help keep its stores open are pushing for a liquidation agreement to be approved by the court during a hearing on Oct. 13, or risk a default.
According to an amendment to an agreement with lenders submitted Tuesday, the retailer must sign a liquidation agreement by Oct. 7 — revised bid notwithstanding.
A process to then liquidate the remaining Sears locations could start as soon as Oct. 19.
“There is a massive swing in value,” if the process is not started by then, Joe Latham, a lawyer for Wells Fargo Capital Finance Corp. Canada, told the court.
If a proposal to buy the business as a going concern does not materialize, he added, it is key to liquidate before athe Christmas season is over to maximize the value the process can attain.
This comes after the court-appointed monitor said in a report earlier this week that Sears Canada is losing money on a weekly basis but will have enough liquidity to fund its operations until Nov. 7.
“We have a very short fuse on a potential liquidation of the company,” said Jeremy Dacks, a lawyer representing Sears from law firm Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP. “We do have a going concern bid that has issues that still need to be resolved and a matter of days, not weeks, to proceed.”
On Wednesday, Justice Hainey gave the green light for the sale of 12 Sears stores and its wholly-owned subsidiary and appliance retail chain Corbeil. The judge also approved the sale of a Sears distribution centre to Indigo Books and Music, as well as the sale of three home services businesses.
A proposal to sell the Viking appliance brand to Canadian Tire, however, was adjourned on Wednesday, as another party has the first right of refusal.
Mark Zigler, a lawyer with Koskie Minsky representing thousands of pensioners, said a decision must be made between the two paths before Sears Canada as soon as possible. He said they are not opposed to a proposal to buy the company as a going concern, but the delays in the process leaves pensioners “bearing the brunt” of the cost.
“The pensioners are paying the price,” he said.
“We cannot continue to be funding this exercise.”
Sears Canada could face liquidation as soon as mid-Oct. | Money | Toronto Sun
If you've been following this story, you'll know that some of the executives have stiffed this fund out of about $200,000.
I haven't really been following it except for what I happen to catch on the news but I do wonder if part of the problem is due to the demand for more third rate quality at cheap prices. Their demise wouldn't surprise me as I imagine they will follow the routes of Eaton's and Woodward's.
What's always funny with these failures is that there are always retention bonuses to keep the executives who led the company into bankruptcy. If they were in charge of the failure, why keep them on?
In news that comes as a surprise to exactly nobody, Sears Canada is asking for permission to liquidate ALL remaining stores.
Their demise makes sense to me...
Why buy a $75.00 golf shirt at Sears when you can get the same shirt at Winners for 10 bucks...or Value Village for 3 dollars. I hadn't stepped into a Sears in over 25 years.
Why buy a $75.00 golf shirt at Sears when you can get the same shirt at Winners for 10 bucks...or Value Village for 3 dollars. I hadn't stepped into a Sears in over 25 years.
Led into bankruptcy?
LOL wtf?!!
It's happening across the board because the money has gone bye bye in different directions
What in the World Is Causing the Retail Meltdown of 2017?
In the middle of an economic recovery, hundreds of shops and malls are shuttering. The reasons why go far beyond Amazon.
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/04/retail-meltdown-of-2017/522384/
No mention of what you said at all...
So your posts were just empty condescension
Sears Canada looking to close all remaining stores, leave 12,000 out of work
Armina Ligaya, THE CANADIAN PRESS
First posted: Tuesday, October 10, 2017 01:13 PM EDT | Updated: Tuesday, October 10, 2017 07:53 PM EDT
Sears Canada Inc. has decided to shut its doors and is seeking approval to liquidate its roughly 130 remaining stores — leaving another 12,000 employees across the country without a job.
The embattled retailer, which sought protection from its creditors in June, said Tuesday it had failed to find a buyer that would allow it to continue as a going concern.
The court overseeing Sears Canada’s operations is set to hear a motion Friday seeking approval for the liquidation and wind down of the business.
“The company deeply regrets this pending outcome and the resulting loss of jobs and store closures,” Sears Canada said in a statement on Tuesday.
Last week, Sears received a revised bid from a buyer group led by its executive chairman Brandon Stranzl to buy the business and keep it operating. It was the latest move in a weeks-long discussion process after Stranzl stepped away from his role to launch the bid.
However, on Tuesday, the retailer said that “following exhaustive efforts, no viable transaction” was received. A lawyer for Stranzl did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Sears Canada’s court-appointed monitor FTI Consulting Canada told the court last week it would consider the revised bid but the company was running out of money and time.
Sears Canada currently has 74 full department store locations, eight Sears Home Stores, and roughly 49 Sears Hometown stores, facing closure, according to company spokesman Joel Shaffer.
The retailer currently has approximately 12,000 employees, three-quarters of which are part-time, Shaffer added. Of the roughly 800 employees in Sears Canada’s head office, the vast majority will leave next week, he said.
That tally doesn’t include the 2,900 job cuts Sears Canada previously announced in June, when it announced the closure of 20 department store locations, 15 Sears Home stores, 10 Sears Outlet and 14 Sears Hometown locations.
Sears Canada plans to start the liquidation sales no later than Oct. 19, a process which is expected to continue for 10 to 14 weeks.
However, Susan Ursel, a lawyer representing current and former Sears Canada employees, says a liquidation would be “extremely detrimental.”
“We are dismayed to say the least that this is going in this direction,” Ursel said in an interview. “But we are working, along ... with pension representative council, to pursue all avenues possible as an alternative to liquidation. So, it ain’t over yet.”
She would say only that they are looking at “different forms of a going concern operation.”
Litigators for a group of lenders who have provided debtor-in-possession financing to Sears Canada to keep it afloat pushed for a liquidation agreement to be entered into by Oct. 7 at the latest. The lenders pushed for approval no later than Oct. 13, in order to liquidate before the crucial holiday season and maximize value.
Sears Canada has been operating under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act since June, but had been struggling for years as consumers gravitated towards e-commerce and away from big department stores.
Jean Rickli, a senior advisor with retail and marketing consulting firm J.C. Williams Group, said the retailer had taken some positive steps to revitalize the brand in recent years, such as a new logo and utilizing pop-up shops.
“Frankly, it was all a little, too little, too late,” he said.
Sears Canada has faced a “slow and steady demise over the last 20 years,” said retail analyst Bruce Winder, the co-founder and partner of Retail Advisors Network. He pointed to sales declines, dusty shelves and a lack of investment in technology.
The move towards liquidation is the latest evidence that the Canadian retail industry is in “major flux” and that companies that were safe decades ago are now “in jeopardy”, he added.
Winder added that the Canadian retail landscape is much smaller now, making it tougher for the thousands of Sears Canada employees to find new jobs of similar calibre.
“It’s a sad day for us in retail, in many ways,” he said. “(For) the employees, as well as losing an icon.”
Sears Canada looking to close all remaining stores, leave 12,000 out of work | C
Armina Ligaya, THE CANADIAN PRESS
First posted: Tuesday, October 10, 2017 01:13 PM EDT | Updated: Tuesday, October 10, 2017 07:53 PM EDT
Sears Canada Inc. has decided to shut its doors and is seeking approval to liquidate its roughly 130 remaining stores — leaving another 12,000 employees across the country without a job.
The embattled retailer, which sought protection from its creditors in June, said Tuesday it had failed to find a buyer that would allow it to continue as a going concern.
The court overseeing Sears Canada’s operations is set to hear a motion Friday seeking approval for the liquidation and wind down of the business.
“The company deeply regrets this pending outcome and the resulting loss of jobs and store closures,” Sears Canada said in a statement on Tuesday.
Last week, Sears received a revised bid from a buyer group led by its executive chairman Brandon Stranzl to buy the business and keep it operating. It was the latest move in a weeks-long discussion process after Stranzl stepped away from his role to launch the bid.
However, on Tuesday, the retailer said that “following exhaustive efforts, no viable transaction” was received. A lawyer for Stranzl did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Sears Canada’s court-appointed monitor FTI Consulting Canada told the court last week it would consider the revised bid but the company was running out of money and time.
Sears Canada currently has 74 full department store locations, eight Sears Home Stores, and roughly 49 Sears Hometown stores, facing closure, according to company spokesman Joel Shaffer.
The retailer currently has approximately 12,000 employees, three-quarters of which are part-time, Shaffer added. Of the roughly 800 employees in Sears Canada’s head office, the vast majority will leave next week, he said.
That tally doesn’t include the 2,900 job cuts Sears Canada previously announced in June, when it announced the closure of 20 department store locations, 15 Sears Home stores, 10 Sears Outlet and 14 Sears Hometown locations.
Sears Canada plans to start the liquidation sales no later than Oct. 19, a process which is expected to continue for 10 to 14 weeks.
However, Susan Ursel, a lawyer representing current and former Sears Canada employees, says a liquidation would be “extremely detrimental.”
“We are dismayed to say the least that this is going in this direction,” Ursel said in an interview. “But we are working, along ... with pension representative council, to pursue all avenues possible as an alternative to liquidation. So, it ain’t over yet.”
She would say only that they are looking at “different forms of a going concern operation.”
Litigators for a group of lenders who have provided debtor-in-possession financing to Sears Canada to keep it afloat pushed for a liquidation agreement to be entered into by Oct. 7 at the latest. The lenders pushed for approval no later than Oct. 13, in order to liquidate before the crucial holiday season and maximize value.
Sears Canada has been operating under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act since June, but had been struggling for years as consumers gravitated towards e-commerce and away from big department stores.
Jean Rickli, a senior advisor with retail and marketing consulting firm J.C. Williams Group, said the retailer had taken some positive steps to revitalize the brand in recent years, such as a new logo and utilizing pop-up shops.
“Frankly, it was all a little, too little, too late,” he said.
Sears Canada has faced a “slow and steady demise over the last 20 years,” said retail analyst Bruce Winder, the co-founder and partner of Retail Advisors Network. He pointed to sales declines, dusty shelves and a lack of investment in technology.
The move towards liquidation is the latest evidence that the Canadian retail industry is in “major flux” and that companies that were safe decades ago are now “in jeopardy”, he added.
Winder added that the Canadian retail landscape is much smaller now, making it tougher for the thousands of Sears Canada employees to find new jobs of similar calibre.
“It’s a sad day for us in retail, in many ways,” he said. “(For) the employees, as well as losing an icon.”
Sears Canada looking to close all remaining stores, leave 12,000 out of work | C
Sears Canada granted permission to liquidate remaining 130 stores
Armina Ligaya, THE CANADIAN PRESS
First posted: Friday, October 13, 2017 10:12 AM EDT | Updated: Friday, October 13, 2017 01:10 PM EDT
TORONTO - For Blaise Lyle, Sears Canada’s decision to shut its doors for good after 65 years stirs up a lot of emotion.
After all, the national retailer, which received approval from an Ontario judge Friday to liquidate its remaining stores, has been a steady fixture in his life since he started as a sales associate there some 39 years ago, as a teenager in high school.
Over that time, Lyle says, he got married, had children and watched them graduate by the time he was terminated in June from his role as an in-store marketing manager.
“My Sears family was always part of any celebration I ever had in my life... It was more of a family for me, but it’s also an end of an era, for Canada,” said the 58-year-old Toronto man.
Sears Canada is set to proceed with its proposal to liquidate its remaining roughly 130 stores across the country — putting another 12,000 employees out of work — after getting the green light from Ontario Superior Court on Friday.
That tally doesn’t take into account the first round of 59 store closures after the department store retailer asked a court for protection from its creditors in June, when the company laid off 2,900 employees, including Lyle.
Sears Canada had as many as 17,000 employees in June.
In addition to the layoffs, it has also lost some of its workforce to attrition over the past few months, said Susan Ursel, a lawyer representing current and former employees.
The process of liquidating inventory could start as early as Oct. 19, and continue for 10 to 14 weeks, stretching closing sales across the busy holiday shopping period.
Sears Canada currently has 74 full department store locations, eight Sears Home Stores, and 49 Sears Hometown stores, which all face closure.
The impact will be felt particularly in smaller centres, where Sears Canada is often an anchor in the local malls serving those communities.
Justice Glenn Hainey approved Sears Canada’s motion Friday, saying he was satisfied that there was no viable alternative, and extended its creditor protection until January 22 to allow for the liquidation process.
Orestes Pasparakis, a lawyer representing the court-appointed monitor FTI Consulting Canada, said it supported the liquidation because it did not think there was any other option.
“We recognize that today the order will effectively bring Sears Canada’s 65 years as a national retailer to an end,” he told the court. “Many people have worked hard to understand whether there is a viable alternative. It appears that there is not.”
A buyer group led by Sears Canada executive chairman Brandon Stranzl had been in discussions to purchase the retailer and continue to operate it. Stranzl, who stepped away from his role with the company in August to launch a bid, was in the Toronto courtroom on Friday. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment submitted via his lawyer.
Jeremy Dacks, a lawyer for Sears Canada, told the court Friday the company had remained optimistic and many stakeholders worked “tirelessly around the clock,” but ultimately decided liquidation was the best way forward to maximize value for stakeholders.
Details of any potential bids have not been made public as confidential information during the sales process are generally kept secret under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act.
Under the terms of the liquidation agreement, Sears Canada can terminate the agreement if another potential transaction emerges, but will need to pay a break fee and expense reimbursement totalling $4.55 million.
Andrew Hatnay, a lawyer representing Sears pensioners, said his team had been actively engaged in discussion for a potential transaction over the past 10 days. Despite Friday’s approval, he said outside the court he planned to continue those discussions and “the issue remains on the table.”
He also added that pension benefits will continue without interruption for the time being, and his team expects to assert a claim for the pension deficit to be paid in priority to other creditors.
Vera Asselin, who along with Lyle was in the Toronto courtroom on Friday, was far less optimistic than Hatnay.
She has been following the proceedings since she was terminated from her job in inventory allocation at Sears Canada’s head office in June, and felt it was important to be there in person.
“We want to make sure that there are faces,” she said.
“That people understand that there are employees that are people that have families that are affected by all of this.”
Sears Canada granted permission to liquidate remaining 130 stores | Canada | New
Armina Ligaya, THE CANADIAN PRESS
First posted: Friday, October 13, 2017 10:12 AM EDT | Updated: Friday, October 13, 2017 01:10 PM EDT
TORONTO - For Blaise Lyle, Sears Canada’s decision to shut its doors for good after 65 years stirs up a lot of emotion.
After all, the national retailer, which received approval from an Ontario judge Friday to liquidate its remaining stores, has been a steady fixture in his life since he started as a sales associate there some 39 years ago, as a teenager in high school.
Over that time, Lyle says, he got married, had children and watched them graduate by the time he was terminated in June from his role as an in-store marketing manager.
“My Sears family was always part of any celebration I ever had in my life... It was more of a family for me, but it’s also an end of an era, for Canada,” said the 58-year-old Toronto man.
Sears Canada is set to proceed with its proposal to liquidate its remaining roughly 130 stores across the country — putting another 12,000 employees out of work — after getting the green light from Ontario Superior Court on Friday.
That tally doesn’t take into account the first round of 59 store closures after the department store retailer asked a court for protection from its creditors in June, when the company laid off 2,900 employees, including Lyle.
Sears Canada had as many as 17,000 employees in June.
In addition to the layoffs, it has also lost some of its workforce to attrition over the past few months, said Susan Ursel, a lawyer representing current and former employees.
The process of liquidating inventory could start as early as Oct. 19, and continue for 10 to 14 weeks, stretching closing sales across the busy holiday shopping period.
Sears Canada currently has 74 full department store locations, eight Sears Home Stores, and 49 Sears Hometown stores, which all face closure.
The impact will be felt particularly in smaller centres, where Sears Canada is often an anchor in the local malls serving those communities.
Justice Glenn Hainey approved Sears Canada’s motion Friday, saying he was satisfied that there was no viable alternative, and extended its creditor protection until January 22 to allow for the liquidation process.
Orestes Pasparakis, a lawyer representing the court-appointed monitor FTI Consulting Canada, said it supported the liquidation because it did not think there was any other option.
“We recognize that today the order will effectively bring Sears Canada’s 65 years as a national retailer to an end,” he told the court. “Many people have worked hard to understand whether there is a viable alternative. It appears that there is not.”
A buyer group led by Sears Canada executive chairman Brandon Stranzl had been in discussions to purchase the retailer and continue to operate it. Stranzl, who stepped away from his role with the company in August to launch a bid, was in the Toronto courtroom on Friday. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment submitted via his lawyer.
Jeremy Dacks, a lawyer for Sears Canada, told the court Friday the company had remained optimistic and many stakeholders worked “tirelessly around the clock,” but ultimately decided liquidation was the best way forward to maximize value for stakeholders.
Details of any potential bids have not been made public as confidential information during the sales process are generally kept secret under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act.
Under the terms of the liquidation agreement, Sears Canada can terminate the agreement if another potential transaction emerges, but will need to pay a break fee and expense reimbursement totalling $4.55 million.
Andrew Hatnay, a lawyer representing Sears pensioners, said his team had been actively engaged in discussion for a potential transaction over the past 10 days. Despite Friday’s approval, he said outside the court he planned to continue those discussions and “the issue remains on the table.”
He also added that pension benefits will continue without interruption for the time being, and his team expects to assert a claim for the pension deficit to be paid in priority to other creditors.
Vera Asselin, who along with Lyle was in the Toronto courtroom on Friday, was far less optimistic than Hatnay.
She has been following the proceedings since she was terminated from her job in inventory allocation at Sears Canada’s head office in June, and felt it was important to be there in person.
“We want to make sure that there are faces,” she said.
“That people understand that there are employees that are people that have families that are affected by all of this.”
Sears Canada granted permission to liquidate remaining 130 stores | Canada | New
Sears, the store that should have and could have, but didn’t
By Mark Bonokoski, Postmedia Network
First posted: Saturday, October 14, 2017 04:36 PM EDT | Updated: Saturday, October 14, 2017 04:40 PM EDT
A cartoon in iPolitics, its headline being the single word, “Sad.” shows a huddled mass of Canadian Sears employees crying over the loss of 12,000 jobs.
The second frame? A huddled mass of tearful Canada Revenue Agency employees crying over the loss of 12,000 Sears workers who will no longer be audited over accepting staff discounts.
It was cruel, but accurate.
While I may have a marketing certificate from the Queen’s University School of Business, earned way back in the last century, I am no expert on what works in today’s marketplace.
But I do know this.
Every time I walked into a Sears Canada outlet, and it was usually around Christmas, it was like walking into the 1970s.
There was nothing “modern” or hospitable about the place. There was no buzz, just cavernous spaces on too many floors.
Who wants to travel up three levels to look at mattresses when there are box stores selling nothing but mattresses?
Ditto with drapes and blinds and appliances.
Sears once had it all, of course. Fifty years ago, it was where most young families went. It was where they could get credit.
Founded in 1952 as Simpson-Sears, a national retail and mail-order business in partnership with the Robert Simpson Co., of Toronto, and Chicago’s Sears Roebuck, it was seen as the major benefactor when Eaton’s went belly-up in 1999.
But it didn’t pay attention.
Why it did not migrate its hugely-successful and innovative catalogue enterprise to a more sophisticated e-commerce model early into the game is beyond anyone’s understanding.
But it didn’t. And, while it was asleep, Walmart, Best Buy, Canadian Tire, Sleep Country, Costco and Winners moved in.
And then Amazon.
That wasn’t just a death knell. That was a buzzer going off.
A CBC story the other day quoted a 27-year Sears employee from Corner Brook, Nfld., who said she felt let down by the company where she had worked more than half her life.
“I feel very betrayed,” said Gail Paul, who thought she would be retiring with full pension in 2019.
“I really didn’t expect them to just lay us off, and shut the stores.”
A retail consultant out of B.C., however, said the end of Sears could be seen coming from kilometres away.
“This took a heck of a long time, but the writing was on the wall 20 years ago,” said Richard Talbot.
“It’s very sad, and it’s just amazing how they could fritter away their name, reputation and business model.”
He also found it “astounding” that a company with a catalogue business across an entire country “somehow messed up when e-commerce was coming in.”
“It was theirs to lose,” said Talbot.
And lose it they did.
The Sears I most frequented was in the central Ontario city of Peterborough (Pop: 81,000), but it could have been any Sears in Canada.
They all look the same.
All I knew is that it carried the brand of facial creams that my wife likes, and so it was easy-peasy Christmas shopping.
And they gift-wrapped too.
The loss of 12,000 jobs, however, is always a tough pill to swallow. For Peterborough, it means 87 employees will soon be looking for jobs elsewhere in a town where jobs are few.
In September, for example, the unemployment rate in Peterborough fell to 8.3%, but it nonetheless remains the highest jobless number in Ontario, and the fourth highest in all of Canada.
On Friday, a judge sealed the fate of Sears’ 12,000 employees, and granted the company permission to shut itself down.
Thanksgiving is over, and Christmas is coming.
All those tears are real.
markbonokoski@gmail.com
Sears, the store that should have and could have, but didn
By Mark Bonokoski, Postmedia Network
First posted: Saturday, October 14, 2017 04:36 PM EDT | Updated: Saturday, October 14, 2017 04:40 PM EDT
A cartoon in iPolitics, its headline being the single word, “Sad.” shows a huddled mass of Canadian Sears employees crying over the loss of 12,000 jobs.
The second frame? A huddled mass of tearful Canada Revenue Agency employees crying over the loss of 12,000 Sears workers who will no longer be audited over accepting staff discounts.
It was cruel, but accurate.
While I may have a marketing certificate from the Queen’s University School of Business, earned way back in the last century, I am no expert on what works in today’s marketplace.
But I do know this.
Every time I walked into a Sears Canada outlet, and it was usually around Christmas, it was like walking into the 1970s.
There was nothing “modern” or hospitable about the place. There was no buzz, just cavernous spaces on too many floors.
Who wants to travel up three levels to look at mattresses when there are box stores selling nothing but mattresses?
Ditto with drapes and blinds and appliances.
Sears once had it all, of course. Fifty years ago, it was where most young families went. It was where they could get credit.
Founded in 1952 as Simpson-Sears, a national retail and mail-order business in partnership with the Robert Simpson Co., of Toronto, and Chicago’s Sears Roebuck, it was seen as the major benefactor when Eaton’s went belly-up in 1999.
But it didn’t pay attention.
Why it did not migrate its hugely-successful and innovative catalogue enterprise to a more sophisticated e-commerce model early into the game is beyond anyone’s understanding.
But it didn’t. And, while it was asleep, Walmart, Best Buy, Canadian Tire, Sleep Country, Costco and Winners moved in.
And then Amazon.
That wasn’t just a death knell. That was a buzzer going off.
A CBC story the other day quoted a 27-year Sears employee from Corner Brook, Nfld., who said she felt let down by the company where she had worked more than half her life.
“I feel very betrayed,” said Gail Paul, who thought she would be retiring with full pension in 2019.
“I really didn’t expect them to just lay us off, and shut the stores.”
A retail consultant out of B.C., however, said the end of Sears could be seen coming from kilometres away.
“This took a heck of a long time, but the writing was on the wall 20 years ago,” said Richard Talbot.
“It’s very sad, and it’s just amazing how they could fritter away their name, reputation and business model.”
He also found it “astounding” that a company with a catalogue business across an entire country “somehow messed up when e-commerce was coming in.”
“It was theirs to lose,” said Talbot.
And lose it they did.
The Sears I most frequented was in the central Ontario city of Peterborough (Pop: 81,000), but it could have been any Sears in Canada.
They all look the same.
All I knew is that it carried the brand of facial creams that my wife likes, and so it was easy-peasy Christmas shopping.
And they gift-wrapped too.
The loss of 12,000 jobs, however, is always a tough pill to swallow. For Peterborough, it means 87 employees will soon be looking for jobs elsewhere in a town where jobs are few.
In September, for example, the unemployment rate in Peterborough fell to 8.3%, but it nonetheless remains the highest jobless number in Ontario, and the fourth highest in all of Canada.
On Friday, a judge sealed the fate of Sears’ 12,000 employees, and granted the company permission to shut itself down.
Thanksgiving is over, and Christmas is coming.
All those tears are real.
markbonokoski@gmail.com
Sears, the store that should have and could have, but didn