Word: store
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...lightning trips around his empire, he thinks nothing of flying 7,000 miles in four days, starting his sessions with Sears store managers at 5:45 a.m. sharp, and whirling through stores, speeches, conferences, until everyone else is ready to drop. His clothes are often rumpled, his shoes unshined, his collar open and his tie askew. He wears a battered hat atop his silvery head and a topcoat that looks as if it came off the pile at Sears-which it did. He munches, instead of smokes, cigarettes. Despite his breakneck pace, Wood is still pink-cheeked and healthy...
...small group of fellows can envision the problems of the whole country and make all the decisions at the top level." He has divided Sears' empire into five satrapies and put a vice president in charge of each. Day-to-day operating problems are left entirely to store managers. They plan their own advertising, price their own goods, pick what they want from Sears' vast supplies. They run their own show-as long as they are getting results. The general can quickly tell when they aren't; each store turns in a monthly box score...
...stores were a success from the start. As a reward, Wood was made Sears' president in 1928. He opened more stores, and by 1931 Sears' store sales topped its mail-order business...
...manufacturers produce them. For example, a small slipcover manufacturer didn't have enough money to buy his raw materials when prices were low and deliver the big volume Sears wanted (Sears does 20% of all U.S. slipcover business). Sears volunteered to purchase raw materials for the supplier and store them, charging him only as he needed the materials. Later, Sears helped the manufacturer find a new plant in a small town and recruit a work force of 75, laid out year-round production schedules for him, and gave him a five-year-purchase contract which was enough...
...roaring bull on Latin America, where he has spent $24 million exporting Sears' own methods of production and distribution, to the benefit of the masses. In Mexico, where Sears opened its first store in 1947, the company has freely lent money and technical advice to encourage manufacturing, and now buys 80% of its merchandise locally. In Venezuela, where it found few manufacturers geared to its high volume and rigid specifications when it opened its first store two years ago, Sears now buys 30% of its goods. In Brazil, Sears lost money in 1950 but last year Wood said...