Dick’s closing in Kingsport

[gary_boom]

Article in the Kingsport Times News said they are closing their Kingsport store. Didn’t give a reason. I won’t miss them. 
It is shocking how many empty commercial buildings are in Kingsport and it will only get worse with the largest employer in town laying people off, moving jobs to China and India.

[pssman308]

Well they are a bunch of dicks lol

 

Is Eastman laying off?  They were hiring not long ago.

[Moped]

What a shame.

[Dirtshooter]

Only people I feel for are the employee's.

[Ronald_55]

Part is our strange environment here in the Tri-Cities. At one point, we had 3 BestBuys in a 30 to 40 minute radius. Same thing with lots of other big box stores. I can understand places like Lowes a bit better because no one want to drive 30 minutes home with a truck full of lumber. With the additional push to online from COVID, it is expected to see place s consolidate. As much as everyone one would like to think, I hate to say that I doubt their 2A stance did it. They sell more soccer cleats than gun supplies and always have. 

Kingsport is also losing a lot of places to The Pinnacle which is only 20 minutes away. There is a D1ck's there now too. Also, I have heard chatter that Kingsport is not the friendliest location for retailers. I do not know specifics though.

Eastman has been laying off for years now. Sometimes not enough at once to be a blip on the local news though. I have multiple family members working there in different capacities. It is not longer the "guaranteed a job until you retire" place it was in the 80's. Of course, where is? The outsourcing to other countries is also partially our own fault. I have heard that over 1/2 the people that take the BASIC level test to start hiring into operations can't do 3rd grade math. Out of the ones that pass, a significant percentage don't make it through the drug testing. So maybe a quarter of the people that they actually feel good enough about to interview make to the HR review stage. In the 70's or 80's something like 85%+ passed the same math test. Don't quote me on the numbers, but they are close.

It is not longer the other "first world" countries that are kicking our arses in education. Plenty of "third world" countries are pumping out very competent people with Masters degrees or PHDs while our local population runs meth labs out of their car trunk. I have kids in school and the local education system is a joke. My kids spend more time every day killing time in a class than actually being taught, Once the standardized tests are done, they do NOTHING the rest of the school year. Plus, the teachers are no longer like it was for me growing up. Teachers used to spend a good bit of time every week building lessons and preparing to teach. Now, the teachers will run you over if you are in the road when the last bell rings. They do as little as possible. One of my son's teachers can't even be bothered to make it to his own virtual meetings set up for twice a week. Always has some lame excuse. That teacher also can't even seem to get the required 2 grades per week. He ends up fudging attendance as a grade it seems. This is not just COVID either, he did the same crap last year. How hard is it to give 2 assignments a week? It is a downward spiral. Ask any kid in college for a reason they are going into teaching and the ones being honest will say because they get the summer off. Forget "teaching the future leaders of our country". I will get down off my soapbox now. 

[Johnny Rotten]

There's better choices

 

[DaveTN]

I bet that sign doesn't say $499 anymore. 

[Quavodus]

1 hour ago, DaveTN said:

I bet that sign doesn't say $499 anymore. 

No but, they beat dicks.

[peejman]

6 hours ago, Ronald_55 said:

Part is our strange environment here in the Tri-Cities. At one point, we had 3 BestBuys in a 30 to 40 minute radius. Same thing with lots of other big box stores. I can understand places like Lowes a bit better because no one want to drive 30 minutes home with a truck full of lumber. With the additional push to online from COVID, it is expected to see place s consolidate. As much as everyone one would like to think, I hate to say that I doubt their 2A stance did it. They sell more soccer cleats than gun supplies and always have. 

Kingsport is also losing a lot of places to The Pinnacle which is only 20 minutes away. There is a D1ck's there now too. Also, I have heard chatter that Kingsport is not the friendliest location for retailers. I do not know specifics though.

Eastman has been laying off for years now. Sometimes not enough at once to be a blip on the local news though. I have multiple family members working there in different capacities. It is not longer the "guaranteed a job until you retire" place it was in the 80's. Of course, where is? The outsourcing to other countries is also partially our own fault. I have heard that over 1/2 the people that take the BASIC level test to start hiring into operations can't do 3rd grade math. Out of the ones that pass, a significant percentage don't make it through the drug testing. So maybe a quarter of the people that they actually feel good enough about to interview make to the HR review stage. In the 70's or 80's something like 85%+ passed the same math test. Don't quote me on the numbers, but they are close.

It is not longer the other "first world" countries that are kicking our arses in education. Plenty of "third world" countries are pumping out very competent people with Masters degrees or PHDs while our local population runs meth labs out of their car trunk. I have kids in school and the local education system is a joke. My kids spend more time every day killing time in a class than actually being taught, Once the standardized tests are done, they do NOTHING the rest of the school year. Plus, the teachers are no longer like it was for me growing up. Teachers used to spend a good bit of time every week building lessons and preparing to teach. Now, the teachers will run you over if you are in the road when the last bell rings. They do as little as possible. One of my son's teachers can't even be bothered to make it to his own virtual meetings set up for twice a week. Always has some lame excuse. That teacher also can't even seem to get the required 2 grades per week. He ends up fudging attendance as a grade it seems. This is not just COVID either, he did the same crap last year. How hard is it to give 2 assignments a week? It is a downward spiral. Ask any kid in college for a reason they are going into teaching and the ones being honest will say because they get the summer off. Forget "teaching the future leaders of our country". I will get down off my soapbox now. 

That's interesting. We lived near there 15 years ago and Kingsport schools were considered some of the best around. 

[Raoul]

Its curious in KPT. For some time their superintendents have come out of Greene County. They stay in KPT long enough to get their bearings and a little experience then they move on. It doesn't seem anyone is interested in spending any significant time in the Kingsport system.

[Ronald_55]

4 hours ago, peejman said:

That's interesting. We lived near there 15 years ago and Kingsport schools were considered some of the best around. 

Not in Kingsport City. In a County school system close to Kingsport. 

I thought when an IT director took over as Superintendent when my kids were small he would really ramp up tech. Not so. We have 2 IT guys to cover 15 schools. My son was getting asked by all the teachers in 8th grade to fix stuff so they didn't have to deal with the IT guys. Being in IT, the stuff they seem to not be able to do surprises me. 

[peejman]

13 hours ago, Ronald_55 said:

Not in Kingsport City. In a County school system close to Kingsport. 

I thought when an IT director took over as Superintendent when my kids were small he would really ramp up tech. Not so. We have 2 IT guys to cover 15 schools. My son was getting asked by all the teachers in 8th grade to fix stuff so they didn't have to deal with the IT guys. Being in IT, the stuff they seem to not be able to do surprises me. 

In my experience, grade school IT has been terrible since its inception. Our teachers asked us to fix stuff 30 years ago because the IT people were useless or unavailable. 

We used to live in Church Hill 15-20 years ago. At that time we were planned to move into Sullivan County for the schools when we started a family, but job changes nixed that. Interesting how things change. 

[Quavodus]

I hope the employees can find something better soon.

[analog_kidd]

I still laugh that the Knoxville Dicks is on Peters Rd. Everyone I know calls it Dicks on Peters.

[Erik88]

1 hour ago, analog_kidd said:

I still laugh that the Knoxville Dicks is on Peters Rd. Everyone I know calls it Dicks on Peters.

And for a long time it was Dick's on Peters, across from Harry Lane(Chrysler) 

 

 

 

 

[hornett22]

Something positive in Kingsport for once.