I was also a tech at Sears at the time this happened. I recall them firing all the service writers one day and the rest of us all went into the office, you either stayed or were fired. It was crazy, but I got to stay. I had recently finished Hunter alignment school with Sears and was doing suspension and alignments all day. I went on and moved to the salesfloor and then into management under STG/Sears Tire Group (separated from the full line stores into its own group). I ran a couple of auto centers up to 2001. It was tires, batteries, brakes, suspension and alignments. Jiffy Lube was doing oil changes in our bays and some other maintenance services. It was never the same after that. In its prime, Sears Auto was a power house.