Thread regarding Sears layoffs

Neighborly/Mr. Appliance and the rest of their home service franchises are laughing their asses off at how badly Eddie has screwed up Sears. Every messed up decision by Eddie has been a huge gain for them, and they've exploded under Eddie's watch as Hometown/A&E have turned into caca. If only Sears had a guy like Mike Bidwell as CEO instead of Eddie, Sears would be kicking a– and taking names. It's sad and pathetic that Eddie's whole currently failing go-forward model is duplicating what Bidwell did with his franchises decades ago when he was starting with over fifty billion a year revenue base.

If I can offer any advice to my (former) fellow technicians... it's to look long and hard at the opportunity you have in front of you. You're all tradesmen. Skilled laborers with the opportunity to hang your own shingle and go into business for yourself. The power you hold over your current corrupt employer is knowledge, integrity, and efficiency.

YOU know what needs to be done to deliver the service YOUR customers expect. YOU have the technical training, the first-hand understanding of reasonable routing/scheduling, and parts knowledge to know what to fix and what not to. YOU know that Sears top customer complaints involve scheduling and wrong/NLA parts, and YOU also know how avoid these pitfalls.

I speak from experience that it's terrifying to think about being self-employed for the first time. But most of us have done side work for friends and family and when you really break it down to yourself, being an independent repair technician providing service to a public that chooses YOU is no different. When I first saw my district transitioning from employee techs to contractor techs I was furious. But the day I showed up at a house at the same time as a contracted tech changed my life.

I spent most of the service call talking to this guy as we repaired the washer and dryer - because only Sears would be so inept in it's own processes to send a contractor and a tech to the same house to work on the same appliance industry. What I found out on that service call was more valuable than anything I could've expected. He was a former Sears tech and he explained that he left for the same reasons we all consider every day. The lightbulb moment for me was when he told me about going into business for himself. Over the next few weeks I kept in touch and he walked me through the process he took to free himself from our oppressor. I occasionally met up with him on my off days offering myself up as a free helper - not as a repair apprentice, but as a business apprentice. I learned how he manages his work, his parts (let the local parts house or even Amazon be your warehouse), and his pricing structure. Believe it or not, there's an app for everything.

I'm now 2yrs out from under Eddie's failed experiment and I feel like I'm alive again. I set my own hours, I give honest estimates and timeframes, and I manage my business in ways that support my customers - who in turn support my business (and revenue) growth through referrals. I also stay in contact with my friend because we often refer each other work when we're already booked up. it's a collaboration of competition that I never thought existed. I'm 45yrs old now and have never felt more secure in my purpose or more in control of my destiny. I eat dinner with my kids (single dad) every day and I hope they can be proud of what I do to provide for them.

As for "clean and maintains"... I still sell preventative maintenance checkups on other appliances because it's pure profit. But I also get to pick my battles. I sincerely hope you all get through this nightmare at some point but I would strongly encourage each of you to apply your talents independently - even if it's just starting out on your nights or weekends - if Sears allows you to have them anymore.

A&E was the heart and soul of Sears. Eddie doesn't get this, never got this, and will never get this. People didn't go to Sears to buy a washing machine or a refrigerator. They bought Sears because it got them SATISFACTION GUARANTEED OR YOUR MONEY BACK. They've got Costco for that now, and will drive a couple of hundred miles past a Hometown and Eddie's guaranteed sh–ty service just for that satisfaction.95

I am an in home tech with the company for the moment. I’ve only been here for a long year. I had just moved from another state and needed a job at least for the short term while hoping it could be long term.
Every time the manager starts pushing harder for sales, I check for news about the company and find that it is laying people off and closing stores. Since about mid November the first 30 minutes of each work day starts with a conference call consisting of a brow beating about selling warranties and clean and maintains. I don’t sell much since I’ve always been a technician and only sold what I believe benefits the customer. The mpa’s are good but the home warranty is hard to get behind. Things really seemed to be much more desperate and I felt as though it was time to move on so I start another job in January.
It has really been disappointing to witness how poorly the service side is operated. I literally have days that I have 7 hours of driving with 8 service calls and I’m expected to be finished within 8 hours. I am made to notify customers that we have to reschedule their appointment when it shouldn’t have even been on the my route for that day anyways. By the the time you finally make it to their home, sometimes 4-6 weeks later, they are understandably irate.
I really hate to see people (not just service) hurt that are legitimately trying their butt off to do what is asked of them. I have seen the writing on the wall just in time it seems.

A few years back and entirely because Eddie took command A&E Factory Service had about 5% market share of home services and about 10% of the techs with c-appy and rapidly declining levels of service. Eddie's efficiency and executive acumen at its finest.

Arguing that a barely profitable business unit can somehow continue to exist in an overwhelmingly unprofitable corporation is absurd. Wake up. The cost of service labor is far higher than retail so eliminating that immense overhead along with the antiquated parts inventories, support staff, van leases, warranty portfolio obligations, etc makes perfect sense. A&E barely controls a fraction of the in home service market so the inevitable shutdown of A&E will barely register as a blip on the in-home services market when it happens. The customers will just shop around other service competitors like they already do. Don’t be part of the orchestra on the titanic when it goes down... find a lifeboat. Complacency will only cost you more when you’re competing for the same handful of service jobs that your fellow technicians are applying to.

This is easy.A@E techs are out there selling contracts.30 days later they are sold off to Cross Crounty.They are nation wide with many
Servicers like us doing their work.We go out there collect 100.00 deductible off customers and we do the work.we are the third party and customers are pretty nice to us because we didn't sell the product or the service contract.Much nicer for the tech.

@kqt I understand the sentiment, but all your statement shows is that youre not a competitor. that list of angry customers you mentioned are their customers, not yours. the thing you have to understand about their customers it that theyre used to complaining and getting their way about everything. which is why they get so vocal. but they all know, in the end, they're going to get taken care of.

Home Services has carried the weight for years. everyone in the company knows this, even if they wont say it out loud.

As a competitor I would not buy their list of p-ss-d off customers. I would advertise that since Sears left you high and dry, I can fix your appliances.

Sold. Then you can reapply for your old job at reduced wage and benefits. Rinse and repeat

@12uodp2n-fsy boy, you really don't understand customer service and brand reputation and the support infrastructure involved at all, huh. That kind of thinking is exactly why the commercial and B2B side of Sears went from a multibillion dollar operation cash cow that dominated for decades into cow dung.

There is a plausible reason for this happening.

While A&E may be profitable, the only profit is in the customer list. You don't need the people. So what you do is fire the people and sell the list. The support infrastructure is already present at the new company, and you can always hire more technicians.

People are cost to a company, so even if A&E were acquired as a unit, all that would happen is that there would be layoffs right after the finalization of the sale. Basically, the deciding factor is who ends up taking the financial hit for the layoffs. If the buyer doesn't want to accrue the costs of the layoffs, then the seller does the laying off, but the asking price for the list is higher. If it's more of a corporate merger, then the cost of layoffs is considered during negotiations and the buyer can then use the layoffs to keep incoming promising talent and RIF problematic personnel on their side and take the financial "ding."

Since it's pretty clear that Sears' end game is complete liquidation, what the plausible scenario is, is that Sears will sell the contracts/customer list to the highest bidder and lay off A&E staff. If the technicians are already outsourced, then this scenario makes even more sense.

I mean, it's a horrible development, especially around the holidays, but it's also something that should have been planned for in the last few years.

Anything Eddie touches turns to dust. The man could not operate a Sears lawnmower.

It'd make sense if A&E shuts down, because only an id–t could screw up running a business like A&E, and Eddie has proven time and time again that he is that id–t.

Maybe the point of cutting it is because it is profitable? Seems like a fair number of the recent store closures were profitable stores. The worst ones...gone. The best ones...gone. Sorry, we can't make money any longer, so the company has to shut down. I see this, if true, as a way to speed up the liquidation.

Is he VERY high ? He should cut down on the weed. A&E is profitable.

I was kind of with you up until the part about Home Services not making money and so on. If you believe that HS doesn't make money then 1: You obviously work for retail. 2: You really don't have any understanding of just how much money HS has been raking in over the years. 3: You fail at understanding just how much money HS could be making.

I'll give you that HE doesn't have an understanding of HS and how much money could be made, because they've been picking away at it for years with no regard of how to utilize it. What's been happening to HS is a direct result of people calling the shots that do not know how to make money with it.
Keep in mind that without Home Services, the company would have folded when the merger happened. At that point, they were the only part of the business that still made money. I would imaging that up until a few years ago, that was still the case.

All that said, it would be weird to shut down Home Services because it could just as easily be sold off and doing so would actually make money. Where as closing a store potentially makes money by selling off the real estate, HS doesn't really have any real estate to be sold off. Shutting it down would just put people out of work and cause an operating business to completely lose its value.
In the right hands, HS would be a gold mine because nodamn body is going to come to your home and work on your stuff nationwide. Just like fast food chains work because it's a chain, so does a nationwide network, when done right. It's not been done right. The potential is there, which is what makes it a product that can be sold off to generate money.

However, shutting it down really doesn't make sense, so that may very well be what happens.

Has third party work for Sears A&E dried up to that extent? I thought that was the one remaining part of Sears that might be able to sell off without a hitch since they've been doing work for others for years.

I can confirm this is true

Never heard of A&E? Perhaps you want to consult the Sears Wikipedia page:

A&E Factory Service is the on-site repair service, servicing larger items such as home appliances, electronics, and garden equipment. The A&E brand name was purchased from Montgomery Ward, which used it for their home service unit, and is a joint venture held by Whirlpool and Sears Holdings. A&E Factory Service is a network of mobile service vans with a long history of performing appliance repairs.