Chris sent a message to Edward Lampert – Chairman and CEO of Sears Holdings – Email Address that said:
Mr. Lampert (or whoever filters his email), I just ran across another news article on additional Sears Kmart store closing to occur this summer. Its just another sad article on the fate of Sears and your inability to make any meaningful change in this company since you became CEO.
I was working at the corporate office in 2005 when you took over, and I moved on to another company about 4 months later. Interesting thing is, you are saying the same things now as you did back in 2005...that you were going to transform Sears/Kmart into a retail power again. Its 2016 and it hasnt happened yet.
In my humble opinion, you have made one stupid move after another, starting with bringing most of the Kmart C suite over to run the combined company. A failing company taking over a larger one. Not really smart. From then on, you have not made any substantial move to make Sears a more profitable company, or transform them into a more sustainable company going forward.
The stores look outdated (which you have to know that) and the overall merchandise planning and direction are really no different than they were in 2005. Plenty of changes I would have made to differentiate Sears from the pack of dying mid-tier retailers, but either you or your C suite of idiots did nothing to change your path.
So Sears goes from about a $22B value in 2005 to $2.2B today...a nice 90% drop. Havent made a profit in about 5 years and no real signs of making one coming up soon. Its all real estate value at this point, which Im sure you have to know. Im sure your smart about real estate values, just flat out stupid about running a mid-tier retailer.
Either get out of the way and hire the right people to run the business, or continue to run it into the ground. Sadly, this email probably wont even bubble up to you.
Regards,
Chris
