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Sears Roebuck in the Twentieth Century: Competition, Complementarities, and the Problem of Wasting Assets

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Author Info
Daniel Raff
Peter Temin
Abstract

Sears Roebuck and Co. faced similar challenges in the 1920s and the 1980s. On the strength of the early period's strategic investment decisions, the company grew into the nation's largest retailer and a pervasive factor in the economy. In the later period, unanswered challenges nearly destroyed the company. We analyze the elements that contributed to the success in the 1920s and to the near disaster in the 1980s and place them in a broader and more systematic context. We argue that successful innovations combine a focus on an attractive market with an exploitation and even enhancement of a firm's existing competitive strengths.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Historical Working Papers with number 0102.

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Date of creation: Jun 1997
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Publication status: published as Learning by Doing in Markets, Films, and Nations, Lamoreaux, Naomi R., Daniel M.G. Raff, and Peter Temin, eds., Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999.
Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberhi:0102

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  1. L Hannah, 1997. "Marshall's 'Trees' and the Global 'Forest': Were 'Giant Redwoods Different?," CEP Discussion Papers 0318, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE. [Downloadable!]
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