Sears exits carpet, floor covering businesses
By Lissa Wyman -- Furniture Today, January 14, 2002
HOFFMAN ESTATES, Ill. — Sears is exiting the carpet and installed floor covering businesses but will be strengthening its position in room-size and accent rugs, said Mark Grand, vice president of home fashions.
"We are leaving the businesses because of the complexities involved," he said. "They don't fit into our more simplified business plan for the home environment."
Industry estimates put Sears' total floor covering sales at about $380 million annually. Currently, about two-thirds of Sears' 900 stores sell carpeting, rugs, laminate and resilient floors. Wood and ceramic floors are sold on a regional basis.
Rugs will be the only floor covering category remaining in the stores. Because they are largely "take-with" purchases, they fit Sears' more streamlined approach and will become even more important for its home business, Grand said.
He added that Sears plans to move more aggressively into rugs to gain greater market penetration. Current area rug sales are estimated at less than $100 million in both Sears and its 13 The Great Indoors stores.
Sears will continue to emphasize mid-priced area rugs in its full-line stores, while The Great Indoors stores carry more upper-end product. The assortment and price points in Sears stores probably will not undergo a major overhaul, Grand said.
"Our strength is in the moderate, mid-market customer who wants good quality," he said.
Grand said Sears' rug departments will get a new look later in the year, "but we're not ready to talk about it yet."
Sears' decision to drop carpeting is the end of an era. In the decades immediately following World War II, fiber and tufting technology brought carpeting into the living rooms of middle America, and Sears controlled a large share of the carpet market during the 1950s, '60s and '70s.
