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Comment by criley2 | Hacker News Reader

I mean this seems obvious from a thousand miles away.

Amazon changed the game fundamentally. The only two effective strategies are to challenge them directly (Wal-Mart and their logistics and their free 2 day shipping/no membership website competitor) or to effectively blend the store/online experience with a huge push towards mobile ordering and curbside pickup or gig-style personal shopping delivery.

I'm not sure why Sears thought they could half-ass this transition and kind of do nothing to compete in today's market. Last time I was in a Sears, it was eerie and quiet, it smelled old, the prices were NOT GREAT and I ultimately priced the tools I wanted on Amazon for a good discount. Not like the old Sears Craftsman name and warranty mean much anymore anyway.

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More upscale retail is mostly still doing OK. The well-documented decline of malls is mostly more rural, less upscale properties. (Some chains including, surprisingly, Best Buy are doing OK in spite of online.) Big Box home improvement also seems to be doing OK.

Sears in particular really didn't know what it wanted to be. It did clothes (including buying Lands' End). It did tools, It did appliances. But it wasn't a discounter like Walmart. (Which drove a lot of regional discounters out of business.)

In short, it didn't have a strategy and tried to focus on everything.

The graveyard of history is filled with arrogant titans who felt their size alone would protect them.

All your big hardware stores sell their own line of tools now (Lowe's I think even sills crafstman now)

All your 'cheap' tools come from Harbor Freight

And the high-end is still Snap-on, MAC, SK, those kind of companies

So where does Sears fit in?

Craftsman used to be the middle ground between cheap and professional. That was a solid and useful niche to occupy. Then they got greedy and slid down to the cheap category, leaving no reason to prefer them over anybody else.

And once you lose your reputation, it's impossible to get it back.

At this point, the warranty on Harbor Freight's Pittsburgh hand tools is as good or better than the Craftsman warranty. Quality doesn't seem to be much different, either, but they are astonishingly cheap.

I still prefer to buy Milwaukee for my power tools, at least for anything cordless - lack of battery standardization and interoperability sucks, so once you start buying into one brand, you kind of want to stick with it, and the M18 line is solid.

I have to disagree about the hand tools. The most recent Craftsman tools I've seen have been pretty lousy, and Harbor Freight's tools have gotten pretty darn good, especially considering the price. I have some HF tools, and for a backyard/weekend mechanic, I would happily recommend them; I haven't had one break on me yet (unlike Craftsman).

HF's power tools, on the other hand, I'm not so sure about, but they do look like they've gotten better over the years.

Craftsman name brand was sold already, and their tool quality was already vastly degraded with any of the buyers that knew what they were doing.

And Costco

That's true, the Costco model persists in the era of Amazon, somewhat surprisingly. But they're so aggressive on delivering value to their subscribers (and not by making a Netflix competitor no one wants) that I suppose any good company like that can succeed on a business moat of literally "well-run" "focused on the core mission" "history of consistency" "good ethics" because I guess it's hard enough to emulate those values at scale.

>the era of Amazon

Amazon has clearly opted to go with the value extraction model. They're the polar opposite of Costco. For me, Amazon's retail image is now of a vendor whose goal is to make a commission, while shifting all liability to other unknown vendors. I have no idea what I'm getting at Amazon.

On the other hand, at Costco, I know there's an organization that will stand behind the products it sells, even if they aren't the manufacturer, and they take care of their employees, so I feel more confident the employees are more invested into the products as well.

> I have no idea what I'm getting at Amazon.

When Amazon opened up to third party sellers, the floodgates opened. For many products it feels like buying from Aliexpress but with faster shipping and higher prices.

Most of my Costco purchases are consumable goods -- fruits, vegetables, meat, and other produce. Things that I wouldn't even consider Amazon for. That gets me in the door, and, from there, it wins again over Amazon for convenience since I am already there. They have an excellent return policy and the employees genuinely seem happy and I know that they are well compensated and have health care benefits.

Don't get their bananas, though, they go from green to brown, completely bypassing yellow. I'm pretty sure that they are getting too cold at some point in the supply chain.

>Don't get their bananas, though, they go from green to brown, completely bypassing yellow.

The same goes for their avocados. I'm not sure what the problem is, but they're pretty lousy in my experience. Trader Joe's seems to have the best deal on these that I've found, and they seem to last a long time too.

Best Buy seems to be thriving.

Amazon's showroom? Yeah, I was looking on Amazon for a specific bluetooth keyboard and saw the same one for the same price at BB. I purchased it at BB, as I could get it immediately, and I knew that it was new/unused. If b&m stores can be relatively competitive price-wise (even if a bit more), I'd much rather buy locally. Surely Home Depot and Lowe's (and others) benefit from each Sears store closed.

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