Sears Holding Executive Summary

Sears Holding’s stock continued to decline from 2010 to 2015, during the time when the economy was rebounding from 2007/2008 market crash. Its share price declined from $68.21 on 9th Aug 2010 to $21.55 on 31th July 2015 while all of its industry peers have experienced significant growth. Following chart depicts the stock performance against its industry peers. Of the peers compared Macy’s gained almost 255% and Costco gained 145%. Wal-Mart also gained 38% growth. Sears on the other had is the only company that experienced negative growth due to its decreasing revenue. Sears lost 68% of its stock value in the last five years. Appendix 6 depicts the Sears stock performance against its peers during the last 5 years.

According to 2014 10K filings, Sears Holdings service and merchandise categories are divided into five categories and are defined as:
1. Hardlines—consists of home appliances, consumer electronics, lawn & garden, tools & hardware, automotive parts, household goods, toys, housewares and sporting goods;
2. Apparel and Soft Home—women's, men's, kids', footwear, jewelry, accessories and soft home
3. Food and Drug—consists of grocery & household, pharmacy and drugstore; …show more content…
Service—includes repair, installation and automotive service and extended contract revenue;
5. Other—includes revenues earned in connection with our agreements with SHO and Lands' End, as well as credit revenues and licensed business revenues.
The Chart in Appendix 3 depicts revenue by segment. All of the company’s major divisions are experiencing continued decline in revenue. “Hardlines” and “Apparel and Soft Home” divisions that constitute almost 70% of its revenue are losing revenue faster than the remaining segments. In 2014 “Hardlines” and “Apparel and Soft Home” lost almost 20% and 30% respectively when compared to 2013. As these two categories are major contributors to the revenue, they demand more attention and a turnaround