Check out what I drug home from Kmart (I need help... get me on hoarders)

[Howard_Casto]

So yeah after 40+ years our Kmart is shutting down.... last one in the state actually.  They are starting to put their fixtures on sale.  I picked this former watch/jewelry display up for 30 bucks.  It was filthy and the white plastic inside has yellowed, so I went about taking the thing apart.  The mirrors on either side are affixed with double-sided tape and they are actually what give it it's rigidity.  40 year old tape doesn't hold that well though, so I managed to pull them off which gave the whole thing a little bit of flop... which then allowed me to bend the sides a little and pop out the center panel for cleaning.  I think I'm going to use it for my portables.... I threw a few in there.  The larger portables like the game gear and 2ds don't fit due to how close the shelves are, but this thing is double sided, so I'm thinking of cutting this bad boy down the center and making it twice as tall.  I can then cut out every other shelf from the other panel to allow me to display the tall guys.  I've got to make a marquee and replace the locks as well.  I'll also put some led strips in the top, which should light up the marquee and the shelves below.  In addition, I'd like to run some charge cables to the shelves, so I'd have a nice place to charge them all.  They still have three of these left and I'm tempted to buy them... I have no clue where I would put them though.  Oh and they have mannequin arms for 5 bucks..... what happened to the rest of them?

[pbj]

Man, I remember those things, you could probably flip them to antiques/junk dealers. 

[Howard_Casto]

I believe these are at least 30 years old.  I don't remember the jewelry counter getting a revamp since the 90's anyway.  I doubt the junkers would want them... we've had 10 Kmarts shut down in the past two years.  I still might get some more though.... they'd be great for displaying small hobby-type stuff. 

[Osirus23]

Last time I was in a Kmart was in 2015 I think. Closed now. It was bizarre, like going back in time to 1995. All those old fixtures like you have there and other retail relics that no one else used anymore. The electronics section had a bell that would go off whenever you entered it and everything there was just... off a bit. The video game cabinets were mostly empty, but what was in there was even stranger. A whole rack of copies of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King (despite there having been 2 expansions since) and even a few brand new PS1 games, though just ---smurfy--- sports titles. Like I said, just bizarre. The only reason I was there was to get a Craftsman wet-dry vac. It was on sale on their website so I went to pick one up, but it wasn't on sale in the store. They would not price match their own website's prices. No wonder this place died.

[JimmyU]

There’s only one KMart left in Illinois. Most stores were outdated 20 years ago. No wonder there’s so few left.

[Howard_Casto]

I put some acetone above each seam for every other shelf, let it sit and then pried them off.  The surface is all messed up, but that's just a result of the plastic welding they used to put them on originally.  I'm going to take some poster board and/or vinyl and recover the whole thing anyway.  Some portables are on the white side while a lot are black, so I'm thinking a nice, neutral gray or silver.  I've still got a million feet of silver vinyl lying around.  You'll note I took the mirrors and topper off....  The thing is the display was so old the double sided tape (which is usually clear) had yellowed, and since you can see that inside the case it needed to be re-applied.  I'm thinking of screwing it to those tabs on the top anyway.... it'd make it easier to take apart for cleaning.    I threw up my game gear, a 2ds and a tablet just as an example, but I think I could put a dmg Gameboy  a gbc and some of those taller cousins on there pretty well. 

It cleaned up good and I now know that I can take shelves off with a little elbow grease.  I'm seriously considering getting more now.  They have some of the 6 sided ones as well, but I don't know if the backs come off of those.