Sears cuts 100 jobs at headquarters

HOFFMAN ESTATES, Ill., April 17 (UPI) -- Sears Holding Corp. cut 100 jobs at company headquarters in Illinois, a spokesman said.

The layoffs follow 200 job losses announced by the company in February.

Spokesman Chris Brathwaite said the reduction affects a variety of jobs, the Chicago Tribune reported Thursday.

Cuts at the retail giant, which owns Sears and Kmart, amount to 6 percent of a workforce of 5,000, Brathwaite said.

"In 2008, we need to reverse much of the profit erosion we experienced in 2007," Sears Chairman Edward Lampert wrote in a letter to shareholders.

"It won't be easy, especially if the economy stays soft," he wrote.

Large appliance sales -- about 15 percent of the business, amounting to sales of $7.6 billion in 2007 -- has become a risk-factor during a housing market crisis, the newspaper report said.