On this site, from 2015 to 2017, I argued repeatedly that retailers simply weren't appreciating the new set of challenges facing their industry. On conference call after conference call, executives blamed "the economy" or "the promotional environment" (the latter of which apparently was, at that time, a living, breathing, independent entity) instead of responding to the obvious upheaval caused by Amazon.com (AMZN) and other online retailers.
Stage Stores (SSI) was one of the biggest offenders. CEO Michael Glazer continually blamed ever-worsening same-store sales on the oil and gas bust, instead of