Tuesday, May 01, 2007

Sears, Friendly Center, Greensboro, North Carolina. Main store building, circa 1990. (Sears Roebuck & Co.)

Previously on LiveMalls
Sears, Friendly Center
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9 comments:

  1. GroceryingFriday, May 04, 2007 11:50:00 AM

    love the old logo!

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  2. BillyTuesday, May 08, 2007 5:32:00 PM

    A nice little blast from the past. When did they replace that logo?

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  3. LivemallsTuesday, May 08, 2007 7:01:00 PM

    cantnot: It used to look really good with the old signs and the red panels at the entries.

    Billy: My guess is that they removed the old signs around 1996 or so. They remodeled the store at the same time.

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  4. AnonymousSunday, May 20, 2007 1:22:00 PM

    Ahhhh....back when Sears was a great and unique store.

    Funny thing is a lot of the old Sears stores still had the old 70's logos and 80's or older look in the early to mid 90's.

    So you may think I lived during the 70's but in actuality I shopped in older looking stores in the 1990s!

    Now every Sears looks like every other Sears pretty such,sigh.

    (remember when they had high ceilings? and bright red and white stores?)

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  5. LivemallsSunday, May 20, 2007 9:30:00 PM

    I do remember the high ceilings and the red and white color scheme. I also remember when they had restaurants, candy & nut counters, and later, arcades in their stores. The good old days.

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  6. AnonymousWednesday, May 23, 2007 7:03:00 PM

    Sears,used to be a spectacular experience,their stores used to feel so huge! and unforgettable!

    What happened,you say?

    I think they lost they're uniqueness and "magic" once they began focusing more and more about certain aspects of their store for their image rather than the store experience overall.

    Like when they started making a big deal about the fact they have Craftman Tools,Kenmore appliances,and brand name clothing lines.etc.etc.

    I'm not saying that advertising the fact you sell certain items other stores don't have ISN'T a bad thing,it's just when you rely on success by advertising special brand names only,you begin to stop sticking out from the rest of the crowd. Which isn't a good thing since you arn't offering anything new to the customer compared to other companies.

    Point being,is that when a store starts advertising only brand names along with lower prices its starting to show that a company is beginning to flounder,or what I call the "just existing stage". This has been demonstrated over and over again by defunct companies in their later life before going under.

    Ames in its later ads advertised over and over again,low prices and brand names,but that didn't save them from bankruptcy.

    http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Ames+ad&search=Search

    Same thing with Caldor they emphasized on the fact they sell brand name products in many of their ads,still once again didn't prevent their demise.

    http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=caldor+ad&search=Search

    same thing with Bradlees,did the same technique of advertising in one specific case advertising that they have Milton Bradley games,they're not around today.

    http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=bradlees+ad&search=Search

    This isn't limited to retail stores either Montgomery Ward had the same type of advertising as well.

    http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=montgomery%20ward&search=Search

    Take a look at the ads for these defunct stores and others and you''ll notice a pattern.

    Overall,once a company isn't making any noticeable breakthroughs or changes in their image,or being the one of the leaders in the industry they're in trouble.

    However this isn't the only problem Sears has had another was inventing all those separate divisions such as Homelife,Sears Hardware,Brand Central,Hometown,Neighborhood,and etc.

    I wouldn't count Sears as failing, just yet they have radically changed their image in advertising,and they may be redefining the design of their stores.(if they decide to implement the new concept) The way that their merger with Kmart has effected Kmart seems promising.

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  7. LivemallsThursday, May 31, 2007 10:57:00 PM

    Lots of great evidence of a failing startegy, Mark. If Sears sells the same brand names as everybody else, why shop Sears?

    I wish they'd go back to doing their own thing. The old-school Sears was a lot more interesting than this crap we got now.

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  8. Jake NelsonMonday, October 22, 2007 5:23:00 PM

    I would like to see department stores go back to having a wider variety of departments. I wasn't around for the age of candy counters or arcades, but it sounded like fun.

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  9. LivemallsTuesday, October 23, 2007 1:38:00 AM

    I was around for part of it, and having the extra departments made things more fun at Sears and other stores.

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