Frank Lazenbury is sitting on a bench outside Sears at the Erin Mills Town Centre with a shopping bag full of deeply discounted sneakers and underwear while his wife Brenda hunts for more bargains.

“My wife is waiting in the checkout line to buy a sweat shirt and a frying pan,” he says.

“I just wanted to get out of there. She can shop forever.”

Bright yellow, black and red signs scream “Store Closing” and “Entire Store on Sale.” Dismembered white mannequins hang out together in one corner and silver-plated fixtures are stacked every which way in bins inside the parking lot entrance, surrounded by dust and a pile of leftover Christmas season glitter.

Lazenbury could have actually bought the Stanfield’s and Joe Boxer branded shelving unit to go with his purchase. The 82-year-old has parked himself on the bench at the Sears’ mall entrance in Mississauga countless times, watching the world go by while his wife shopped.

But this was to be the very last time he would ever wait for her to come out of Sears. The anchor department store in the Mississauga mall is one of the last 32 locations across Canada that was still open last week but will be closed for good Sunday, marking the official end of the chain’s historic retail reign of more than 65 years.

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Liquidation sales started at Sears’ 130 stores in Canada at the end of last October after the debt-saddled company, which started restructuring amid huge losses last June, received court approval to shut down all of its operations. Overall, 12,000 people lost their jobs when Sears became one of many casualties in the unforgiving retail landscape. Last Monday another 37 stores closed across the country.

“We’ve lived in Canada for 50 years and have seen them all go one by one: Eatons, Marks & Spencer, Woolco, K-Mart,” said Brenda Lazenbury when she finally emerges from the discount bonanza.

The couple is originally from England and shopped at Sears well before the Erin Mills mall and its anchor tenant both opened in 1989.

“When we came here in 1968, this wasn’t here but there was always the Sears catalogue,” added her husband, a retired parts distributor for Ford Canada.

“I liked this place a lot. They had good sports clothing, shoes, trousers and winter jackets. But I also order online from Marks & Spencer and they deliver to Canada in four days,” he said.

“But I think the quality went down in recent years,” added his wife. “We bought a washer/dryer that doesn’t fill up with water so we have to put our clothes through twice.”

Erin Mills Town Centre was pretty quiet last Wednesday with Christmas and Boxing Day done for another year, but lineups at the liquidation sale were long, starting at lunchtime.

As Sears faded into the sunset, though, it looked more like the old Honest Ed’s than a typically clean and well-appointed department store. Just inside the doors at the Sears mall entrance, the store was an absolute jumble. Two big racks of Lagostina frying pans were parked right at the door and just a few steps away was an assortment of scuffed and stained ladies’ tank tops on hangers, along with bras in all colours and sizes strewn over wall hooks.

“They’ve been stretched so much the size A looks like a D,” quipped a pregnant woman, who said she stopped by when she noticed the big sales signs on her way to the doctor.

One shiny white baptism outfit which amazingly appeared clean stood out on the racks among the kids’ summer shorts on sale for $5.99 in bright neon orange and green, all of which had been well picked over by bargain hungry shoppers in the dead of a record-setting cold winter.

All items had been moved to the top floor of the Sears store, rendering the lower level a ghost town right down to the eerily abandoned cash registers, lone upholstered chair covered in garbage bags and card payment machines slumped over the empty counters. The only thing for sale on the vacant floor were clothes hangers going for a dollar a dozen.

Upstairs, a Weider bench press that was originally $1,500 was on sale for $200. It sat next to a beaten up Bowflex home gym machine covered in soot.

Close by was a curly-haired toddler who amused herself by loudly shaking the rails on the “70 per cent off” sign that stood upright in front of a clam-shaped, red plastic sand box while seniors with sore feet rested on some wobbly blue stools that were also heavily discounted.

Sears Canada announced in June it plans to close 59 locations and cut 2,900 jobs under a court-supervised restructuring. Here’s a look at the history of the retail giant. (The Canadian Press)

“We came to Canada in 2014 and always shopped here because we live nearby,” said the 3-year-old girl’s mom Hanan Mousa.

“But with online shopping I think a lot more retail shops will close,” she added.

Jiuseppina Minado is a lifelong customer who visited Sears every weekday while she and her husband waited to pick up their granddaughter from school near the mall. She says she’s sad not only for herself but for the workers who lost their jobs.

“Sears was really my store. We bought all our appliances here. If there was a problem you could just bring it back and they would help you. Very nice people worked here,” said Minado, who moved to Canada 59 years ago.

“Before Sears came here, we would make a special trip to Toronto to shop there,” she said after loading up on jeans, Oscar de la Renta perfume and lipstick.

Outside, above the blaring liquidation posters, a banner that still says “Major Reinvention in Progress” remained beside the Sears logo, taking on a sad new meaning. It was leftover from the last failed makeover to trendier clothes and home items that the giant retailer tried before going under.

Closing for good

The last stores that will close Sunday include:

In Ontario:

Kitchener

St. Catharines

Windsor

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Brantford

Hamilton

Stratford

Bramalea

Toronto-Promenade

Erin Mills

Thunder Bay

Barrie

Sudbury

Newmarket

Oshawa

Peterborough

Belleville

Pickering

Across Canada:

St. Jérôme, Que.

Anjou, Que.

Laval, Que.

Lasalle, Que.

Sherbrooke, Que.

St. Jean, Que.

St. Bruno, Que.

Fleur de Lys, Que.

Place Laurier, Que.

Joliette, Que.

Trois Rivières , Que.

Lévis, Que.

La Capital Québec

Capilano, B.C.

Burnaby, B.C.

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