Sears Eyes Appliances ‘Waiting to Betray You’

BANNOCKBURN, Ill. —  They’re the things that go bump in the night--the snubber, the wigwag and the splutch.

If you think you’ve entered the land of Dr. Seuss, check your tool belt at the door and scram, pal.

Those things are common parts and tools for household appliances, and this is Sears boot camp. It’s a hands-on learning course for repair people.

The average home has dozens of appliances, “all waiting to betray you,” Sears asserts in commercials running in six U.S. cities. And if it’s war they want, war they’ll get from many of Sears’ 14,000 service people brought annually to a warehouse-like building here to get down and dirty with gizmos and gadgets.

For periods ranging from one to 10 weeks, six instructors teach courses on fixing all makes and models of everything from lawn mowers to camcorders, washing machines to furnaces. They’re part of Sears’ plan to increase its revenue by building up its appliance repair business.

“We’re always challenged, as you can imagine, with having 14,000-plus technicians and having hundreds of new models come out every year in appliances that we have to bring them up to speed on,” says Duff Maynard, the company’s national training manager.

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In several laboratories sit the innards of televisions and the husks of refrigerators. In others, technicians work to quickly disassemble oven doors. An instructor drones in yet another room about the “FM demodulator on IC201” as technicians learn how to repair a video camera.

“This is basic training camp,” Maynard says. “If someone needs to know how to work on a washing machine, here’s where they come. A television set, here’s where they come.”

For years, Sears technicians fixed only the retailer’s private label lines, such as Kenmore, under extended service contracts it sells with the appliances. But in the early 1990s, around the time it began selling other labels, it began training technicians to repair all appliances, and it has quietly built up the business.

“We’re the reason the Maytag repairman is so lonely, because so many of those Maytags are being repaired by Sears,” Maynard quips.

As the only nationwide home repair service, Sears controls 20% of the market, with most of the rest belonging to independents.

With little room for expansion in its core department store business, Sears is turning to the multibillion-dollar home services field. It hopes to watch it grow at a double-digit rate over the next few years, said Jane Thompson, president of Sears Home Services.

“I think we’ll look back and say that this is obvious that we should have been building this business all along,” Thompson said. “People just don’t know what we do and how well we do it, and we’re looking to change that.”

Now, the company is becoming more aggressive and hopes its name recognition will help boost business significantly in the next year.

Ads pitching the “service side of Sears” play on its popular “softer side” slogan. The ads are running in four test markets--Dallas-Ft. Worth, Texas; Jackson, Miss.; Rochester, N.Y.; and Tampa-St. Petersburg in Florida. A nationwide television campaign is likely to begin by spring, company executives say.

Some independents worry they’ll get squeezed by Sears’ push to capture more market share.

“That’s big business for you--always trying to squeeze the little guy,” laments the owner of Walt’s Appliance Service in Chicago, who would give only his first name. “They’re a big competitor now and have been for years, so all I can do is hope there’s more than enough business for everybody.”

Sears hopes to win business in part with its promise of 24-hour phone-in service with two-hour appointment windows by the next day. The most common repairs include the washing machine pump, the washing machine timer, the dryer belt, the dryer rollers and the washing machine belt.

Sears is taking its quest so seriously that it also requires service people to take instruction on how to interact with a customer. And so they take part in role-playing games at regional training centers around the country.