The rise and fall of Sears is the perfect symbol of retail's challenges over the last decade

Mike Segar/Reuters

Sears is a case study in the importance of not falling behind in retail.

• Sears has confronted some major struggles over the past 10 years, including a dramatic bankruptcy.
• The once-iconic brand's ongoing crisis shines a spotlight on the intensely competitive nature of modern-day retail.
• Sears' plight shows exactly how crucial staying ahead - or at least keeping up with - the pack has become in the world of retail.
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Sears, Roebuck, & Co. could practically touch the sky in 1969. At the height of its powers, the retailer began constructing a Chicago skyscraper to house its employees that year. Finished in 1973, Sears Tower was, for a time, the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere.

Three decades later, the naming rights to the tower expired. Sears by then was a far different business from the company that had undertaken the skyscraper project. The New York Times reported that by 2004, the company had vacated its namesake building altogether. In 2009, the Willis Group bought the naming rights.

Now, 10 years later, Sears is emerging from a traumatic bout with bankruptcy, closing stores by the hundreds and laying off employees by the thousands.

Retail is often an unforgiving industry, and the company's experience over the past decade has been a clear reflection of the importance of avoiding falling behind. Where other retailers like Walmart and Target have succeeded by adapting to challenges like the rise of e-commerce, Sears has struggled to find its footing.

Meanwhile, Sears' current predicament also raises questions about the importance of meeting consumer expectations. Former CEO Eddie Lampert has been accused by critics - including former executives who spoke to Business Insider's Hayley Peterson in 2017 - of rendering many Sears and Kmart stores crumbling ghost shops in his bid to cut costs and keep the company afloat.

Here's a look back at how things have gone from bad to worse for the struggling department store chain, and what it demonstrates about the world of retail: