I was in our local Sears store a few months ago and their tool dept. was reduced down to about 10'x10', down from a large chunk of the store's floor space and stocked with only a few handyman tools like screwdrivers and hammers. That was a real shock. They did a pretty good job at selling appliances and ladies clothing but depts. like exercise equip. & riding mowers have been lackluster and the sales folks would almost beg you to buy something when you walked by.
When I was a kid back in the 60s, dad used to drive us to Simpson Sears at least a couple of weekends a month, even if we (more like "he") didn't need anything. It was the only place like it and they basically owned the market, selling a large range of products. In '52 in Canada, Robert Simpson Co. merged with Sears Roebuck to become Simpson Sears. They used to have a pretty cool catalogue (waaay before the internet) - I clearly remember studying the ladies lingerie section a lot before moving on to the tools & hardware section. Back then, if you wanted tools, you went straight to Simpson Sears and bought Craftsman stuff (made in the US of course). I don't even remember there being any other place to go to except maybe a lumber yard, a few mom & pop hardware stores and Woodwards (a long defunct chain of retail & food stores only in BC & Alberta).
Operation, ownership, store/company names & locations, gov't intervention marketing has been through a rather convoluted process in Canada over time as in this Canadian history outline:
http://http://vintagemachinery.org/mfgindex/detail.aspx?id=754 At one point, they even had a Sears at one end of a mall and a Simpson-Sears at the other end. Ridiculous. In recent times we've had stores like Canadian Tire, Princess Auto, HD and others come into the marketplace, a lot of manufacturing going offshore and now many just buy directly off the 'net. I think, in Canada at least, they've become a victim of their own poor management and failure to keep up with the times and competitors. I don't think they will survive long, at least in the form we've known it. Who knows what the future will hold tho. now that Mr. T. vows to turn the world upside down.
Sears used to be a trailblazer with some products like their line of Arts & Crafts kit houses in the early part of the last century like here for ex.
http://http://www.searsarchives.com/homes/1915-1920.htm I still have a small handful of old Craftsman tools from the 30s & 40s when dad was a machinist and will pass them on to my kids.
Both sets have different configurations and the parts numbers are different. For us tool guys it's not a big deal, but for the average consumer it's going to be a pain.