Sears’ Lands End Shop
I went to the nearby Sears the other day - I know, don’t tell my bosses - and they were just putting the finishing touches on the new Lands’ End concept shop. They pulled together all of th Lands’ End apparrel in the Mens and Misses Departments with new fixtures, graphics, visual elements, and updated merchandising. Beautiful graphics anchored by light wood trimed fixtures with deep blue walls made this area really stand out. The two apparel areas are seperated by the new style of self-service (”open sell”) shoe bunkers that Sears has recently put in (following the lead of Kohls and Target, among others). As a visual merchandiser, I was really impressed - as a consumer, I was really drawn to the area and wanted to shop.
But, looking at Sears from an industry standpoint, I don’t know how well this concept is going to work for them. The downfall is this launch lies within the brand, on two different levels. One, how strong is the Lands’ End brand with consumers today? And two, how does Sears look to brand itself to consumers across the board? There seems to be some disarray within how Sears is being marketed (no clearer sign of this than the recent decision to drop the ‘Essentials’ line of stores and convert them all to ‘Sears Grand’) and what their leverage is with consumers.
When I walked into the area, I felt as if I was in J.Crew. Sleek tables with beautiful presentations of pants and shirts, all wonderfully brought together with accessories and shoes. They are really pushing the entire collection and it looks great. However, walk outside of that area and you are reminded of exactly what Sears has become - a dumping ground for a mish mosh of unattractive clothing and horrible merchandising. Walking away from the Lands’ End shop and there are six-ways of clearance merchandise dragged out to the middle of the aisle. Tables look horrible, racks are all over the place, and the merchandise is just not presented well.
Which is why the true test of this Lands’ End rollout will be in how well the stores are able to keep this up. I was in the store the day that the Corporate team was there, setting this up fresh for the first time. Of course it is going to look great - but will it still look great in two weeks, two months, or two seasons from now? The new visual elements look great but Sears is not a visual company - last I knew, they had no ‘visual merchandiser’ positions in their stores anymore. To my knowledge, it is all up to the departments to do their own. Will they be able to keep up with this? Judging by the way the rest of their stores look, I’m not sure.
At the end of the day, I just don’t think Lands’ End is as strong as it once was and that they are sacraficing floor space from other brands and merchandise assortment that they could be offering. There are a lot of eggs in this basket and for Sears shareholders, I hope it is a gamble that pays off.
I guess there is another note to make with this entry, and that is that I approached this whole entry strictly talking about the apparel end of Sears. I know Sears is not an apparrel retailer - their big money is made in hardware and hardlines. So, with that said, this entry is strictly referencing the apparrel side of Sears.
A few weeks ago I needed some new jeans, so I did some research online and it seemed like the Levis 514 slim straight fit was comparable to the (discontinued) Gap Slim Fit ones I had been wearing for 2 years. So I took myself to Sears knowing that they carried Levis merchandise, but when I got there I seriously couldn’t make heads or tails of their organizational schemes in that area. I wasn’t sure if I was in the “work wear” section or the “fashion ” section since the Levis stuff was lumped in with the Dickies and the Carhartt merchandise. Kohl’s was my next stop and they didn’t have them either, but at least I could safely assume that if I couldn’t find them on the wall between the 512s and the 517s, they most likely weren’t there at all.
What a fascinating entry.
It is actually very funny that you wrote that, because the reason I went to Sears was to buy the Levi 514s. I also had trouble finding them, but eventually stumbled upon the rack just as I was getting fed up and was about to leave. I actually love the fit of them. The only other store that I believe carries that cut, locally, is JC Penny. From time to time, I talk to the people in Corporate who are more knowledgable about the kind of products we buy and I am going to find out why we don’t carry the Levi 514s!
[...] had previously written about Sears’ Lands End shop when they rolled out out, as one of the stores in my area appeared to be one of the first to roll it out. I have been [...]