Midtown Sears To Shut Down In January

MIDTOWN HOUSTON, TX — The store that became incredibly famous for its annual shopping catalog is closing the doors for good at several stores, including an iconic one in Midtown. The Sears located at 4201 Main will shut its doors for the final time in late January, part of a robust downsizing nationwide. A liquidation sale will start Nov. 10.

Sears plans to close hundreds of locations nationwide. Having already shut down about 180 stores so far in 2017, the number is expected to rise even higher as each quarter's financials are released.

"This is not an effort solely aimed at cost savings but is part of a strategy we have been executing against as many of our larger stores are too big for our needs," company spokesman Howard Riefs said in a statement.

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With growing online sales in the retail world, traditional brick-and-mortar stores like Sears faced challenges like bringing customers back through the doors all the while increasing its online footprint, sharpening its distribution and trim the fat of the low-performing stores.

To battle a growing debt problem, the company sold its Craftsman tool brand to Stanley Black & Decker in March for almost $1 billion.

The Midtown location was built in 1939 as a state-of-the art building at the time, even equipped with air conditioning. It was a popular spot when the annual Sears & Roebuck catalog hit mailboxes, and again during the holidays when folks from all over flocked their for holiday and Christmas shopping.

As the city developed and suburbs got built, shopping foot traffic dispersed in several directions away from Midtown, but not all at once. First there was the move south, and then east, north and west. That, along with folks leaving the for the suburbs and its new malls and outlet stores, having a store in Midtown no longer made sense.

Image: A Sears store is shown Thursday, March 23, 2017, in Houston. Sears, a back-to-school shopping destination for generations of kids and the place newlyweds went to choose appliances, has said that after years of losing money that there is "substantial doubt" it will be able to keep its doors open.(AP Photo/David J. Phillip)