Sears suing Lampert for looting them

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Rumor was that he was really interested in Sears' real estate portfolio: Sears was an anchor store in a lot of malls and either owned the mall itself or the biggest unit in the mall. Their real estate assets are worth way more than their brand names or other assets. Sears was/is worth more in parts than as a whole, why else would Lampert have purchased it?

We have HBC here in Canada and they started carrying higher end brands and targeting higher end clients, but I think that will only work as long as Baby Boomers have money to spend on nostalgia. Once they are gone, they will be holding sand just like Sears.
 
Classic case of people at the top of a company making a grab just before their retirement.
I've seen it in the form of paying themselves exhorbitant salaries & bonuses even when a company is sinking. This one was more clever, but maybe not sneaky enough.
 
Originally Posted by slacktide_bitog
Kmart is a BITOG favorite, and Lampert's looting has caused Sears to close most of their stores.

Finally the company is calling him out.



Because Kmart (like Sears) literally gave things away (Shop your way points) for free. You can't stay in business that way. Not enough profits......
 
Willful failure of fiduciary responsibility is a serious crime. Although it won't restore the company to before-Lampert stature, hopefully they get a judgment against him that sends a message to all current and aspiring CEOs. Prison time would be nice, but they'd probably just stick him on a beach somewhere on our nickels.
 
Originally Posted by maxdustington
Rumor was that he was really interested in Sears' real estate portfolio: Sears was an anchor store in a lot of malls and either owned the mall itself or the biggest unit in the mall. Their real estate assets are worth way more than their brand names or other assets. Sears was/is worth more in parts than as a whole, why else would Lampert have purchased it?

We have HBC here in Canada and they started carrying higher end brands and targeting higher end clients, but I think that will only work as long as Baby Boomers have money to spend on nostalgia. Once they are gone, they will be holding sand just like Sears.

This might have been true 10-15 years ago but malls have been on the decline for some time and online shopping has most of them at the brink.

Regarding mall location, stores that are in the middle do much better due to the foot traffic than stores at the ends. This was a flaw in mall design as anchor stores like Sears were placed at the ends. Sears also did this due to its auto care centers.

This action is way too late. One has to wonder what the board of directors has been doing all this time.
 
Some retreat to low overhead small town stores again.
I still do business with a couple of those … One opened two years ago …
(Returning to our city) …
Getting rid of this vulture + replacement with an actual leader … would be a last great hope …
They have to stay small anyway … Walmart and Bezosmart have it all …
 
I think Lampert is a major reason for a lot of Sears latest issues. He seems to have done so many things to benefit himself rather than help Sears get back on his feet.

He was a financial guy not a retailer. Sears needed a retailer.
 
Exactly … Fox in the hen house … companies used to fend off corporate raiders …
 
Originally Posted by PimTac
This might have been true 10-15 years ago but malls have been on the decline for some time and online shopping has most of them at the brink.

Regarding mall location, stores that are in the middle do much better due to the foot traffic than stores at the ends. This was a flaw in mall design as anchor stores like Sears were placed at the ends. Sears also did this due to its auto care centers.
Depends on the mall. I live in Toronto and the two malls I have visited the most are attached to public transit. One of them is downtown, but the other is in the borough I live in and has condos, municipal buildings and a community center within 1000m. That mall (Scarborough Town Center) also had a Sears in it. It also had a long defunct Eaton's that became a Wal Mart. My friend works at the downtown mall, the Eaton Center. It is plenty busy.

I agree, a mall in the middle of nowhere, Anytown USA is not going to have as much foot traffic or be as valuable. However, malls in population dense, arterial areas will be worth big bucks. Those anchor sized units are perfect for gyms.
 
Originally Posted by maxdustington
Originally Posted by PimTac
This might have been true 10-15 years ago but malls have been on the decline for some time and online shopping has most of them at the brink.

Regarding mall location, stores that are in the middle do much better due to the foot traffic than stores at the ends. This was a flaw in mall design as anchor stores like Sears were placed at the ends. Sears also did this due to its auto care centers.
Depends on the mall. I live in Toronto and the two malls I have visited the most are attached to public transit. One of them is downtown, but the other is in the borough I live in and has condos, municipal buildings and a community center within 1000m. That mall (Scarborough Town Center) also had a Sears in it. It also had a long defunct Eaton's that became a Wal Mart. My friend works at the downtown mall, the Eaton Center. It is plenty busy.

I agree, a mall in the middle of nowhere, Anytown USA is not going to have as much foot traffic or be as valuable. However, malls in population dense, arterial areas will be worth big bucks. Those anchor sized units are perfect for gyms.




There are always exceptions to everything and perhaps Canada is different in how shoppers shop. In the US, malls are closing. Even urban malls are either shutting down or they are reinventing themselves. One idea that has been a standard in Asia is to make a mall a center of sorts. This kind of planning includes condo towers at the mall which gives it a local shopper base instantly. Offices are located at malls as well. Malls can have a variety of options and not just retail shopping. Medical clinics, spas and exercise facilities, even small hotels. It is similar to what Japan has done with major train stations where you can shop, eat, get your dry cleaning and everything else in one stop.

None of this will save Sears. They have been as dead as a can of corned beef for a decade now.
 
Originally Posted by PimTac
There are always exceptions to everything and perhaps Canada is different in how shoppers shop. In the US, malls are closing. Even urban malls are either shutting down or they are reinventing themselves. One idea that has been a standard in Asia is to make a mall a center of sorts. This kind of planning includes condo towers at the mall which gives it a local shopper base instantly. Offices are located at malls as well. Malls can have a variety of options and not just retail shopping. Medical clinics, spas and exercise facilities, even small hotels. It is similar to what Japan has done with major train stations where you can shop, eat, get your dry cleaning and everything else in one stop.

None of this will save Sears. They have been as dead as a can of corned beef for a decade now.
I'd stay in a Sears hotel if they had a Craftsman-themed room.
smile.gif
 
Malls are dead, and those with any money shop online now anyways (those who can afford it)

Most folks I know have cut their shopping quite a bit over the last 5 years, which include online. Heck, I find I need a lot less now a days.....

Sears will be long gone before the credit lines dry up in the next few years though- doubt they will even make it till June .....
 
Sears was dying with or without him involved. To sue claiming he is to blame, ignores every single reason why the market made it impossible for the Sears profit model to continue.

Kids these days don't appreciate that. They have a 15 minute attention span and cheapest usually wins, so sears tried to fill both roles and cater to that too, then old timers got a knot in their britches and declared they'll never buy sears again, not even the things that were still made in the US, which if they weren't stupid, would have proved their point and been a benefit to everyone.

Instead, stupidity rules and we all lose out and whine about it instead of being happy. Folks used to just be happy about buying things then lately they have been blaming someone else. Idiot egos, screwed those of us who wanted to support US products.

There's always that "I think I'm special regardless of the fact that my specialness extends no further than wiping my own arse" and therefore I declare the cheapest thing I can find, is automatically equal to anything else made in China.

The Chinese are laughing their arses off.
 
Originally Posted by PimTac

This might have been true 10-15 years ago but malls have been on the decline for some time and online shopping has most of them at brink.


Nah, around here they are building strip malls left and right, our local population is about the same as 1980 but we have probably 5x more retail locations.

Indoor malls are at the brink because

1. Stores entered from the outdoors pay 1/3 of the property tax as indoor malls (on average)

2. There are government backed loans for strip malls that developers commonly walk away from if they don't get the tenants they want.

3. There is far too much retail and restaurants in general for the population and income levels, government backed loans have encouraged uneccesary building of hotels and retail space that no one needs or uses leading to inevitable decay and foreclosure

4. Semi traffic is subsidized by the government, trains are not, make the semi pay for the resources they use and amazon Prime will fail overnight since bulk single delivery locations are much less affected than individual packaging services by gas cost.
And honestly, Amazons business model only works below about $4.50 a gallon (if that) even with the subsidies.


Make indoor malls cheaper and strip malls more expensive tax wise and guess what will happen?


Our tax structure decides what business works, simple math.

Further look what sun capital did to Shopko (Which was vibrant growing and profitable)
They bought it for $800,000,000 members of sun capital sat on both boards, they decided Shopko needed to take an $800,000,000 loan after purchasing to pay reimburse themselves then continued to have Shopko take loans to pay their annual pay, this made even a very profitable store become unprofitable and then eventually after Sun capital paid itself more there was no money for creditors vendors or operations .

If a normal person were to do this it's considered a federal crime of usurpery which carries a very heavy set of penalties and prison

Personally the members of sun capital should have all assets removed and liquidated including cars, houses, etc to pay Shopkos various interests then they should be executed since their greed damaged the lives of about 10,000 people. (And ruined dozens of businesses already)

Might set an example so special interests might think 5 seconds instead of just stealing money under a blanket of another company name, ah yeah Shopko did that because I make their decisions but belong to another company
 
Since my last post here got deleted, rephrase using article information. Also being sued, current Secretary of Treasury Steve Mnuchin, Lampert's college roommate and former director at Sears and hedge fund ESL. Also worked with Lampert at Goldman Sachs.

Good luck winning this case against these thieves. They went to the Gordan Gekko school of finance, ie., Greed is Good. This action is too little, too late. Sears/(KMart) is history and Lampert and Mnuchin will out-lawyer the plaintiffs.
 
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