I think it was inevitable that Sears would lose customers to cheaper merchants. Sears was offering employees expensive defined benefit pensions and healthcare. The 80s, 90s, and 00s saw the spending power of the bottom 4 quintiles drop. Even if people wanted to support a Sears type store, they can’t afford to.

Lambert didn’t help, but I think we’re still seeing the hollowing out of the middle class causing a loss of customers for places like Sears that could have paid middle class wages and sold decent quality goods.