Farewell to Kmart. Shopping at Kmart used to be a socially-viable institution. A kind of homage to Super Walmarts of America.

 "Last Kmart store in Michigan, the chain's home state, prepares to close doors in November". The Hill. September 28, 2021.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/retail/2021/09/28/last-kmart-michigan-to-close-in-november/5905992001/

I remember (happily) back in my childhood of memories of people in Champaign (Illinois) going to KMart as a form of socially-accepted household shopping. As I read from the article, the Kmart stores began back in 1962. Growing up many people were not embarrassed to say that they got their discount stuff at KMart and there was no shame in saying publicly that this or that was bought at a Kmart. Later on, in the 80's, Kmart became a kind of slur word implying lower class and/or ghetto (also increasing in poverty status in the 90's). I stopped hearing any reference to Kmart once the Walmart explosion altered the American household shopping scene. Then there were a plethora of SUPER WALMARTS.

I had to rely on walking over one mile to a Super Walmart back when I lived in Pensacola after the terrorist organization forced a potentially deadly car crash in a "freak" sick accident that included a migrant worker literally using a grass blower taking the instrument as he blew grass from the side of a busy road I was driving upon to blow dirt directly into my windshield as the terrorist driving the car right in front of me stopped dead in the middle of the road, causing my car to be smashed so badly I had to completely scrap it at the junk yard. The terrorists had also broken my seat belt the week prior to this terror incident thus trying to literally murder me. This happened on my very first day in Grad School at the University of Florida in Pensacola.

I thus had to walk over one mile in that condition to be able to buy food from the terror operation apartment building which I had signed a contract in order to attend grad school. Asides from that:

I discovered that Super Walmarts are an all-in-one life-saving choice for shopping if you do not have a car, if you can't drive to multiple places and the quality of the items is not as flimsy as in Kmart clothing and products (but Kmart was acceptable and often extremely good quality). Yet Walmarts, in particular Super Walmarts, although deemed a kind of working class symbol of grass-munching consumerism, are extremely incredible for people who are in the position I was forced into (also no bus service provided adequate access, as buses lumbered down this one-mile stretch at a once per hour pace, which made shopping very arduous and getting anywhere past 6 pm impossible).

Still, a way of living is now almost dead. The last remnants remain in Illinois of this former shining blue light special (or was that the red light special-) of the Kmart universe. RIP to another memory of having grown up in Illinois.

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"Classic Kmart Commercials From the '80s". Rob's Classic Commercials and Retro Stuff.

 January 21, 2021.

Ameica really needs those ole Kmart "Dollar Days" back: (don't miss Martha Stewart claiming that "class is imagination and not how much you spend" line for the first commercial filmed back when she looked like a completely different homemaker, promoting places like Kmart which were considered "chic" but not expensive by the advertising campaign reps and some American people as well.: But when I was growing up even at the beginning of the Kmart empire, shopping at Kmart was not a sign of consumer chich it was considered working class and/or lower class even back in it's heyday.