User Panel
Posted: 10/26/2013 3:26:08 PM EDT
Just curious.
On a side note, seems like Sears would be doing better if they hadn't abandoned their old business model. They had the Amazon business model down over a century early. |
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My repro sears 1894 catalog has sweeeeet guns and hunting stuff. Like the clothing as well.
ETA.. Sears here is the biggest eyesore shithole with all Hispanic clientele and staff and taco carts every 15' all the way around. It's the worst looking store for blocks in any direction. |
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Things probably started going down hill when FFLs were introduced.
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I was working at sears when they phased out guns.
Too much hassle, too much liability, not enough profit. And that is not counting the pressure being put on by outside assholes. Sears was dying for a long time, it started back in the 70s and was pretty much done with by 2000, what is there now is some misbegotten zombie. |
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Sears is now more of a financial instution than a retailer, sears can go suck a bag of dick as far as I care.
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The same reasons everyone else did as well. Pressure from anti-civil liberty groups coupled with government interference. Apparently some Wal-Marts still sell guns, but I haven't seen one in years.
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Sears went downhill when the malls began. Use to be you could buy anything at Sears, same as Walmart, only good quality american made stuff.
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Someone should troll an Abercrombie & Fitch by bringing a couple A&F marked rifles in for repair.
The video would be awesome! |
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Bought lots of guns from Sears when I was younger. Still have several of the Winchester bolt guns and lever actions. I also bought many a gun at K-Mart to include Marlin Camp Carbines for $177.
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The local KMart stopped selling them when a guy doing the original Hands on a Hardbody contest, flipped out and walked across the street from the Nissan dealership and busted out the door of K Mart and walked in a got a gun and shot himself and I think a few other people.
They stopped the contest too for a while. I think it may be back. |
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The same reasons everyone else did as well. Pressure from anti-civil liberty groups coupled with government interference. Apparently some Wal-Marts still sell guns, but I haven't seen one in years. View Quote Guns are plentiful at Walmart around here. Ammo USED to be plentiful as well. Lots of our Walmarts sell ARs too. |
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Another main shopping place back in the day was Oshman's and Ace Hardware. Montgomery Ward also had a decent selection. I bought my first MKIII Enfield from a Ace Hardware, .303 Brit was 5 cents a round. Oshman's sold surplus gunpowder by the scoop in paper sacks.
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The same reasons everyone else did as well. Pressure from anti-civil liberty groups coupled with government interference. Apparently some Wal-Marts still sell guns, but I haven't seen one in years. View Quote Went to my Local Wally World's this afternoon. They got guns AND Ammo. |
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Quoted: Another main shopping place back in the day was Oshman's and Ace Hardware. Montgomery Ward also had a decent selection. I bought my first MKIII Enfield from a Ace Hardware, .303 Brit was 5 cents a round. Oshman's sold surplus gunpowder by the scoop in paper sacks. View Quote Not sure if they are still in business as they were in a part of town I never go to (Jax is a big place)
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I'm 35. My first 2 guns I got for Christmas as a kid came from KMart. (870 and 10/22)
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Quoted: [...] ETA.. Sears here is the biggest eyesore shithole with all Hispanic clientele and staff and taco carts every 15' all the way around. It's the worst looking store for blocks in any direction. View Quote CLICK.... just so you won't ever have to worry about accidentally doing business with me in EE. |
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Anybody here old enough to have bought guns out of a catalog and have them come to you in the mail?
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Another main shopping place back in the day was Oshman's and Ace Hardware. Montgomery Ward also had a decent selection. I bought my first MKIII Enfield from a Ace Hardware, .303 Brit was 5 cents a round. Oshman's sold surplus gunpowder by the scoop in paper sacks. View Quote I bought my first handgun at Oshmans Sporting goods, in the Mall, the day I turned 21. S & W .357 Magnum, Model 19, target model. 4 Inch. Long gone. |
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I bought a black powder pistol at Service Merchandise when I was 18. My sister bought a S&W .357 magnum at a gun store with a library card.
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Anybody here old enough to have bought guns out of a catalog and have them come to you in the mail? Not me, but I remember my Pops getting an M-1 Carbine in the Mail. He still has it, along with the box it came in. |
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My dad bought an 870 at a gas station, does that count? View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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Anybody here old enough to have bought guns out of a catalog and have them come to you in the mail? My dad bought an 870 at a gas station, does that count? I would say so. My dad bought a High Standard 22 at a gas station in NH. |
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However, they did bring customers into the store like they currently do for Walmart. Sears stores are dirty and dingy; even the one at the upscale Boca Town Center is a poorly lit, sleazy, dirty, dump. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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Lack of profit. Guns are a low margin product. However, they did bring customers into the store like they currently do for Walmart. Sears stores are dirty and dingy; even the one at the upscale Boca Town Center is a poorly lit, sleazy, dirty, dump. The one here is clean, and the tool section looks much as it probably did in the 1980's. There aren't many customers, though, not when their Lands End shirts are all full retail price. Why bother? |
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Quoted: View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted: Quoted: CLICK.... just so you won't ever have to worry about accidentally doing business with me in EE. Feedback: 0% (0) I've never worried about feedback before... but I'm sure there are a couple of ARFCOM folks that would vouch for me. |
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Quoted: Just curious. On a side note, seems like Sears would be doing better if they hadn't abandoned their old business model. They had the Amazon business model down over a century early. View Quote As someone who worked for them and whose dad worked for them... no. You couldn't be more wrong on the models. Sears had a wide variety of issues, but their old business model was dated and led to their eventual downfall (as did their insistence that Walmart wasn't competition, turning away Home Depot to protect the Craftsman line, outdated customer service that was abused, a desire to stick the mall model, and a total and complete lack of innovation plus a large pension fund). Amazon and Sears don't have anything in common when looking at the business models outside "they both sell stuff and it gets delivered". Not that Amazon is profitable or ever has been in the traditional model. EDIT: Just to be clear, if Sears had had good management, it could have been one of the top companies in the world. Had someone like Buffet stepped in the way he did for GEICO, things could have been different. |
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The last one I bought was a Winchester mod 94 from a catalog outfit in 67 delivered general delivery. The postmaster notified the SO and a deputy came to the house to get the number from it.
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I still have some Sears Western Auto and Montgomery Wards marked shotgun shells. In a side note my local Ace hardware stopped carrying guns due to break ins. 30 + over the years and every time they got to the tv in counter first even though all of the guns are in a safe . And every time they break his doors .
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As someone who worked for them and whose dad worked for them... no. You couldn't be more wrong on the models. Sears had a wide variety of issues, but their old business model was dated and led to their eventual downfall (as did their insistence that Walmart wasn't competition, turning away Home Depot to protect the Craftsman line, outdated customer service that was abused, a desire to stick the mall model, and a total and complete lack of innovation plus a large pension fund). Amazon and Sears don't have anything in common when looking at the business models outside "they both sell stuff and it gets delivered". Not that Amazon is profitable or ever has been in the traditional model. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted:
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Just curious. On a side note, seems like Sears would be doing better if they hadn't abandoned their old business model. They had the Amazon business model down over a century early. As someone who worked for them and whose dad worked for them... no. You couldn't be more wrong on the models. Sears had a wide variety of issues, but their old business model was dated and led to their eventual downfall (as did their insistence that Walmart wasn't competition, turning away Home Depot to protect the Craftsman line, outdated customer service that was abused, a desire to stick the mall model, and a total and complete lack of innovation plus a large pension fund). Amazon and Sears don't have anything in common when looking at the business models outside "they both sell stuff and it gets delivered". Not that Amazon is profitable or ever has been in the traditional model. I think they mean when it first started, perhaps. People could pick everything from coffee to musical instruments to camping gear, lamps, furniture, clothing, even a house, and have it delivered with a low combined shipping charge to anywhere in the country. That was amazing at the time. |
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I bought a Savage 110 in 30-06 in 1984 from JC Penney via their catalog. They stopped the practice soon afterwards. I still have that rifle.
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Quoted: I think they mean when it first started, perhaps. People could pick everything from coffee to musical instruments to camping gear, lamps, furniture, clothing, even a house, and have it delivered with a low combined shipping charge to anywhere in the country. That was amazing at the time. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Just curious. On a side note, seems like Sears would be doing better if they hadn't abandoned their old business model. They had the Amazon business model down over a century early. As someone who worked for them and whose dad worked for them... no. You couldn't be more wrong on the models. Sears had a wide variety of issues, but their old business model was dated and led to their eventual downfall (as did their insistence that Walmart wasn't competition, turning away Home Depot to protect the Craftsman line, outdated customer service that was abused, a desire to stick the mall model, and a total and complete lack of innovation plus a large pension fund). Amazon and Sears don't have anything in common when looking at the business models outside "they both sell stuff and it gets delivered". Not that Amazon is profitable or ever has been in the traditional model. I think they mean when it first started, perhaps. People could pick everything from coffee to musical instruments to camping gear, lamps, furniture, clothing, even a house, and have it delivered with a low combined shipping charge to anywhere in the country. That was amazing at the time. Ya. I grew up in the stores. My first hint at boob was the bra section of the catalog like 99% of kids from my generation. Watching it die slowly really killed my dad (figuratively). They had one of the premiere credit cards in the country at one time as well. EDIT: Gosh, I just talked to dad about it again and started telling me horror stories from management. I'm still amazed how the company that started Prodigy when the Internet was made up of AOL, Prodigy, and Compuserve absolutely refused to integrate it into sales. Dad was reporting nightly through a telnet terminal to his bosses, but they refused to put the catalog online because you had three different management teams working online, retail, and catalog. |
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Don't forget that Western Auto sold guns (Revelation), as did Montgomery Wards (Westernfield). I've got a really nice Marlin 336 that wears the Monkey Wards Westernfield name . . . I used to have a Parker Hale Mauser .30-06 that bore the JC Penney name.
Sears sold some GREAT guns. If you ever see a JC Higgins Imperial shotgun you'd be blown away (a High Standard with deluxe wood). They also sold some really nice Spanish (AYA) and Japanese (Nikko) shotguns. |
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I think it's interesting that they used to get special runs of guns made for them. My wife has a Sears Winchester 1894 and one of my cousins had a Montgomery Ward shotgun. While Wal-Mart sells guns, it's not like they have AR-15s with Ol' Roy on the mag well. I think there was some sort of Wal-Mart-only 10/22 furniture not that long ago, but Ruger makes more special 10/22s than the post office makes stamps.
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