Hitting a Man when he is Down.

I started this post yesterday. I came up with a title, tracked down an illustration or two, then had to decide whether to look up a few basic economic facts, or watch the end of March Madness. Had I got around to posting, you would all be amazed today by my prescience. Maybe you would have given me my own hedge fund. Maybe not.

My post concerns J.C. Penney and pajamas. I needed pajamas, and still do. I looked for replicas of the Karen Neuburger garments I have, and started off at Macy’s. My have they gone down hill, and in all honesty, I poked around the internet and don’t think the pajamas are still being made. I may be able to score on ebay, but I don’t have the patience.

Here’s the economics bit. Ron Johnson was wooed away from Apple to be the CEO of Penney’s and he was following the Apple mantra of “Keep it Simple, Stupid”, at the same time introducing new brands. I even wrote him a note shortly after he took over praising some of his new policies. Then things broke down and shares dropped in value, sales dropped as much as 75%.

Back to pajamas. I was offered pages and pages of “garments” like this

I could have had a lace-trimmed sleep short or a stretch lace chemise. The words Flirtitude, Donatella and Jezebel kept cropping up and when I closed the windows in disgust, I was asked to rate my shopping experience. After rows of “On a score of one to ten, did you enjoy shopping at J.C. Penney today?”, I was given the opportunity to write some comments. And I most certainly did. I remember starting off, “I am a 73 year old grandmother and I am looking for appropriate night wear. I have been a customer of your store for almost 50 years and your records will show the amount of money I have spent . . .” I went on to express what I thought of this junk.

This morning I came downstairs to find that Mr. Johnson had been fired. Do you think it was my fault?