Oh, and the CEO saying last spring that we, the consumers, were too stupid to understand what he was doing?
Yeah, I love that attitude. Love it from people who respond to threads like this, too. They simply won't take people at their word that they truly cannot, now, find things at as good a prices as they did before. They like to pretend that NO ONE was getting great deals and that we're just so blinded by the "you saved" notation at the bottom that we ignored the price we paid compared to what we bought.
It's only been very very recently that I'm starting to see the sort of deals I was seeing before. I'm fully in the market for new clothes as I continue to lose weight and will continue to be in the market until I'm in maintenance; I have no other options, since I had donated a whole bunch of my small clothes, thinking I was just too old and would never lose weight (right before I rejoined WW and found out I was wrong, so happily wrong).
I've only been in to the store because DH can still find clothes there in his big/tall size, and they are decent prices (Casual Male is SOOOO expensive). Because we bought him quite a few clothes, so as to avoid a public nudity arrest from his pants falling off (he went down a solid two sizes in pants so far, woo!), we got the $10 certificates, and that has brought me back in. And now I'm seeing prices that I like, vs the high prices I did NOT like.
Maybe some people, shopping in the ways THEY shopped (and not the way I shopped), have found better prices after the change, but I had not.
Oh wait, I did buy a puffy coat a few months back. I *wanted* to replace a coat I bought on a whim just before starting the weight loss, hoping they would have the EXACT item. They had something that looked like my coat but felt TOTALLY different. The fabric both inside and out was just cheaper; felt worse, looked worse, and was NOT worth the money. I needed a coat that fit, however, so I bought a coat for much more than I felt it was worth, because I needed it.
Coupons are CRAP and create a culture of customers who are only loyal when they have coupons in hand.
JCPenney tried to create a best price every day strategy so you didn't have to game the system, wait till the store had a sale to buy what you needed instead of buying it when YOU wanted to buy it... etc etc
We obviously shop very differently. I went there when I thought of them AND had something to buy. I thought of them when I would get a flyer or coupon or something. But I still had to wait until I needed or wanted something, or the price was just soooo good I didn't want to pass it up.
Until very very recently, I simply did not think of them. THAT is what they caused with me. And when I did think of them, if I parked near their store because it's most convenient at my mall, and walked through to get to another store at the mall, I saw almost nothing I liked and no prices I liked.
Because of the two $10 certificates we got after DH's shopping was done, I bought DS a belt that he has needed for awhile, and I bought myself a sparkly dress, purchased online and ship to store (ugh what a bizarre thing that is...one email and then at least a week, and then a phone call...why not an EMAIL?????), which got me in the store twice recently. And I have found literally nothing else worth buying or worth buying at the price they are charging.
Although in JCPs defense, I am finding the problem with ridiculously thin material at a lot of stores recently. It's very frustrating.
Definitely, and for a few years now. But at Old Navy they have $2.50 camisoles right there, and if you buy a sweater there it's a fairly normal sweater, but I found no camisoles at JCP in obvious places and the sweaters I saw on my recent excursions were half-thickness, too!
It was just a couple years ago, while preparing for our December 2010 WDW trip, that I bought a ton of stuff there, and the quality was good, the prices were good (sure I used the clearance racks and a coupon or two). Now that I have to replace it all b/c of the weight loss, I'm just not finding the quality. I'm buying *almost* exclusively at Old Navy right now for myself (and for DS as well).
And they might turn even DH away, because on his most recent shopping excursion we had to SEARCH the store for his section! They didn't have his clothing area labeled at all, and I had to figure out where his clothes were *literally* by noticing that *this* area had bigger shirts on the rack. No "big and tall" signage whatsoever. And no employees around anywhere except socked in at the registers. It was ridiculous.
Sidenote because it amused me....while waiting for the cashier to get my sparkly dress from the back, another employee came into the corral (what I'm calling the cash register areas). She was wearing a minidress with long bell sleeves, nylons, and to-the-knee boots. That outfit, combined with the cross-body strap that held her little scanner/check-out thing that many employees are wearing right now (which is, I admit, kinda cool...DH was checked out where we stood by an employee with one of them), made her look like a Star Trek crew member.
. Well I was hoping they were still on sale online... nope 
. 
). The maidenform type was $50. The exact same item at Target was $24. It's on clearance at maidenform's website for less than $20. 
Why again would I shop at Penny's? My dad and mom went there a few months ago to get custom curtains like they've done for decades, but had absolutely no luck. I had no problem with the lack of coupons, but they had nothing I wanted to buy.
