Dissident Loses Bid for Sears Board Seat

Dissident shareholder Robert Monks was defeated Thursday in his effort to win a seat on the board of Sears, Roebuck & Co. but said his grass-roots campaign had shaken up the retailing giant.

Chicago-based Sears said preliminary results indicate that its three-member management slate defeated Monks, the sole opposition candidate.

Among other things Monks, 57, who owns 100 Sears shares, had argued that stockholders might be better served if the company, a lackluster performer recently, sold off some of its subsidiaries.

“Whatever happens to my candidacy, Sears has been changed,” Monks said before the preliminary results were announced.

“We appreciate the support of our shareholders and associates, which has resulted in a rejection of Mr. Monks’ candidacy,” Sears’ Chairman and Chief Executive Edward Brennan said in a statement.

Brennan, Sybil Mobley and Edgar B. Stern Jr. were reelected to three-year terms on the board.

“Our opposition to Mr. Monks was based upon our belief that our principal responsibility to shareholders is to improve our financial performance so that we might enhance the value of their investment, not to use the Sears boardroom as a forum for Mr. Monks’ personal agenda,” Brennan said.

Monks, 57, who heads a Washington consulting firm, said he budgeted $250,000 of his own money in his effort to win the post, which pays about $30,000 annually.