Here are some photos of the end of the failed experiment to bring back appliances to JCPenney. After only 2 years, appliances were rolled out nearly companywide to directly compete in the downfall of Sears. By year 3 in February 2019, appliances were discontinued by company management. Small appliances can still be found on the JCPenney website, but most of the larger items cannot be found anymore. Pictured here is the JCPenney at Deerbrook Mall about a month after the discontinuation announcement. As you can see from the photos, not much was left at this point in the clearance sale. LG, Samsung, GE, and other major appliances were available. Refrigerators, stoves, ovens, washers, dryers, vent hoods, and accessories were available.
JCPenney had major appliances for such a short period of time that it is probably a good thing that you captured some pictures of their appliance department before we forget that they even brought the appliance departments back. Thanks for the pictures. It's been a while since I've been to Deerbrook Mall, but I do remember that the JCPenney there looked quite nice. However, my last visit was before the Ron Johnson era renovations so I'm not so sure if it still looks as nice as I remember it. The store clearly did get the concrete floor treatment which does not look good IMO.
ReplyDeleteI can see why JCPenney would want to capture some of the appliance sales that Sears was throwing away. Unfortunately, they just didn't have enough to compete against Best Buy and the hardware store chains. Shoppers seem to be staying out of JCPenney stores about as much as they are staying out of Sears stores.
It seemed to me that JCPenney mainly sold mid-level and higher end appliances. I wonder if maybe they would have done better if they sold some cheaper stuff to go along with the higher end stuff. They also had a lot of built-in appliances on display which differs a bit from what you'd see at other chains which sell appliances more successfully. I also believe that JCPenney did not carry appliances in their store inventory so everything had to be ordered. That probably didn't work for people who desperately want a working appliance right away.
I recently visited the Willowbrook Mall JCPenney and Sears stores on a weekend. Neither store was busy during what was probably the busiest time of the week that mall stores would be busy. That said, January isn't exactly a prime shopping season, but still. JCPenney was just as quiet as Sears. In fact, there might have been fewer people at the JCPenney, but I suppose the Willowbrook Sears has more of an open design so it's easier to see people as they shop there than at JCPenney. It was quite sad to see JCPenney that quiet, but I did think the prices were rather high for some of the things I looked at so I can't say I'm surprised that people are staying away. At least the checkout line had nobody in it so I didn't have to wait in long lines like I've had to do at JCPenney in previous years.
The future for JCPenney does not look very bright. We'll have to see what happens. This area has mostly avoided store closures so far in recent years, but I don't know for how long that'll be the case. At least JCPenney does have some newer stores in prime Houston suburbs unlike Sears, but I suspect JCPenney is struggling to compete with Kohl's and even Kohl's isn't doing that well.
I have a few other photos somewhere in my archives, of JCPenney appliance departments when they were fully stocked. I will dig those up and add them once I fix my computer.
DeleteJCPenney did not seem to be very busy at Deerbrook during this past holiday season. San Jacinto was fairly busy, but it is a much smaller store. One thing that is concerning is that the new JCPenney building at San Jacinto Mall has not been started yet. It was supposed to be under construction already to make way for the new buildings that will go up next to Macy's. Hopefully Macy's will not be the only anchor to stay throughout the redevelopment of the San Jacinto Mall site.