Sears has agreed to sell its iconic brand of tools, Craftsman to Stanley Black & Decker Inc. The sale, which comes with massive store closures, will bring in about $900 million. The sale is the third dramatic move for the struggling company in the last two weeks.
Stanley will pay $525 million at closing and $250 million after three years, Sears said in a statement Thursday. Stanley will also will make annual payments on new Craftsman sales for 15 years.
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With Sears department-store business continuing to bleed cash, Lampert has turned to selling and spinning off assets to keep the company operating. The hedge fund manager, who also is the retailer’s chairman and largest investor, agreed earlier this week to lend the company $500 million and said last month that affiliates of his firm would offer it a $200 million letter of credit. Sears also has been reviewing its DieHard batteries and Kenmore appliance brands for potential sales. The Craftsman sale is “another piece of the puzzle of trying to cobble together enough liquidity to navigate ’17,” said Noel Hebert, an analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. “But the more you sell to fund losses, the less there is to sell.” h/t newsmax
Hebert also said the price Sears sold the unit for was “disappointing.”
On another sad note, Sears said it’s closing 150 more stores, part of a program to shrink the retailer’s physical presence to stem its continued losses.
Craftsman has been part of Sears since 1927, when the retailer acquired the brand for $500.