And with the national truck driver shortage going on with no relief in sight, out of stock may be an answer all of us will here more often. Those containers can’t make it to the stores without a truck pulling them!!
http://www.kulr8.com/story/30496958/cabelas-employees-say-managers-confirm-store-will-close-jan-1
looks like its a DONE DEAL.. wow..
Whaaaaat? That article contained nothing but speculation based on rumors of what other people were speculating about.
Plus, even if a deal did get made, would that mean big layoffs at the store level? No freaking way. Retail employees average turnover is anywhere between 80 and 125% per year. No damn way are you going to go in and fire everyone unless you’re closing the store and pulling out of town completely. Who are you going to replace them with?
I think this is all much to do about nothing. If Elliot actually had the cash for a buyout, it’d already be bought. They’re a nickel player hoping to get traction by shaking up the board and pumping up the stock price with big talk about changes so they can do a dump and run based on stock gains.
Maybe BPS is really interested and if that’s the case, it’ll be interesting to see where a privately held firm can come up with $3.5 billion + perineum in cash since they don’t have any stock to swap. They’d have to bring in other investors and if that’s the case, it’s not really BPS “buying” Cabelas, it’d be VC firms buying Cabelas and then letting BPS have some participation in managing them.
Grouse
My question is what happens to all the gift cards and cables buck from the credit card? Spend now, hope they honor them?
I see no reason to worry about this at all. There’s too many very big “ifs”.
1. If a buyout is actually successful
2. IF a buyout happens too fast for any of us to figure how to blow some gift cards. No way anything happens quickly, too much red tape.
3. If the new company decides to shutter the brand name of Cabela’s.
4. If the new company decides not to honor Cabela’s commitments. How much would this alienate the loyal Cabela’s customers and destroy the value in the proposed purchase?
I’m going to sit back and watch things unfold. Nothing will happen fast nor will it happen without official press releases.
As far as the in-person/in-store experience, from the several stores of each brand I’ve visited in the Midwest, I’d say BPS markets themselves as a “destination” more so than just a store. For instance, the Des Moines location has laser-light glo-bowling and a big restaurant, near the horse track. Most of them have the boat sales centers in them as well. They are always fun and entertaining to walk around in, and I’ve found their salespeople to be helpful and knowledgeable. The flagship store in Springfield, MO, is very cool in that they have 500,000sf, and house the NRA National Sporting Arms Museum and Archery Hall of Fame, and the Wonders of Wildlife facility – which when it reopens is supposed to be spectacular. They could do a much better job on their ice fishing product line, that’s for sure.
I believe there was a recent death in the Cabelas family as well, which could have significant estate implications in a transaction. I’d be surprised if this deal got done by January 1, but who knows how long private negotiations have been going on. Maybe now it’s just down to due diligence now. In their last earnings statement where the CEO said sales were off 30% or so, he cited slow buying of clothing. My wife can confirm this because every time we walk into their Woodbury store she says “Cabelas women’s clothing selection sucks! They need a new buyer.”
As someone else suggested, I’d guess that way more product is sold online than in-store anyway.
Bump
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