Sears Service center closing.

[goatfarmer]

There's an article in our paper that the local Sears Service center is closing,one of 20 closing across the country.It says most of the repairs are sent out anyway,and can be dropped off at the main store.
What happens to the technicians? Will they basically be working out of their trucks? I used to work at the Service center,it WAS a decent place to work.

kennyGF

 

[tolivac]

In my area the "Sears" techs were actually contractors.They did not work for Sears directly as an employee for them.Sears provided access to parts,and provided the billing ,record keeping equipment,and a satellite device for their vehicle.

 

[petek]

Sounds to me like an attempt to stop spilling blood. I think Sears (in Canada anyways) has overextended themselves in the fight against Walmart. They went ahead and fixed up nearly all their stores, a good thing actually as they were all looking dated, but then they went and opened huge Home stores selling only furniture and appliances just mere blocks away from the regular stores in some cases. Drive by on any Saturday, any day in fact and you'll see barely a car parked out front while Walmart at the other end of the mall is jammed. Along with the fixing up of the stores they attempt to "upscale" their cothing lines which was tried and failed miserably with our two other national dept store chains, Eatons and Woodwards. Only Eatons and Woodwards didn't have the Kenmore and Craftsman products behind them to slow the bleeding and died quickly. In my mind Sears would have been better off to downsize or eliminate clothing altogether where there is way too much competition and focus on their strongpoints, hardware and appliances.

 

[dalangdon]

I thought that Sears bought Eatons, which constituted their "expansion" into Canada.

Say what you will, the Sears in Downtown Vancouver - a former Eatons - is the most beautiful Sears you will ever see. A close second being the Sears at Southcenter Mall in Seattle - they took over the space of Frederick & Nelson - a lovely old local department store that was for many years a division of Marshall Fields.

AND to top it off, we have the oldest continuingly operating Sears store! (on First Avenue)

 

[fixerman]

continuingly?

Is that french? LOL

 

[petek]

Dan.. Sears has been in Canada for over 50 years now.. they bought out Eatons mainly to get their coveted downtown locations. The plan was to keep running them under the Eaton name but that failed miserably and they changed the Eaton store names to Sears, closed most of the suburban Eatons stores because there were already enough Sears suburban stores.
The odd thing about Vancouver is... about 20 years ago Sears built that big downtown store in Vancouver on the waterfront, the building with that rotatiting restaurant on top..Harbor Front or something.. but it only lasted a couple of years and they pulled out.. Now they've got that new Eatons store right downtown...They did the same in Calgary and took the old Eatons downtown store and fixed it up really really nice, 5 floors, but it's empty of shoppers except at lunchtime on weekdays.