Mail-Order Motoring: The Sears Motor Buggy
The 1909 Sears Model H Motor Buggy – basic, reliable transportation. / THF88309
Long before Amazon, American consumers counted on another company to deliver their wants and needs through the mail: Sears, Roebuck & Company. Founded in Chicago in 1892, Sears grew into the largest mail-order retailer — and, ultimately, the largest retailer, period — in the United States. Over the years, the company’s voluminous catalogs offered everything from clothing to appliances to farm equipment to houses. But even folks who remember those catalogs well might be surprised by another of its past products: automobiles.
From 1908 through 1912, Sears built and marketed a line of high-wheeled motor vehicles. The simple and rugged little buggies were perfectly suited to the rough and muddy rural roads on which many of the company’s customers lived. Sears automobiles exemplified the concept of “horseless carriage.” Their high-wheel design wasn’t especially unusual at the time. Companies like Holsman and International Harvester marketed their own versions of these functional little runabouts.
The cover of Sears, Roebuck & Company’s 1911 automobile catalog. / THF88371
It’s notable that Sears entered the automobile business in 1908. That year is often cited as a watershed for America’s auto industry — Billy Durant formed General Motors, Cadillac earned Britain’s Dewar Trophy for its interchangeable parts, American-built cars won the New York to Paris Race and the Vanderbilt Cup, and Henry Ford introduced the Model T. Add to those the fact that venerable Sears, Roebuck & Company got involved with cars, and it was clear that the newfangled automobile was here to stay.
Sears contracted with designer and builder Alvaro S. Krotz to create its house-brand autos. A trained and skilled engineer, Krotz based his Sears designs on a combination of personal experience, careful study of other contemporary automobiles and a belief in “overbuilding” — making his cars from heavier-than-standard components in the interest of durability.
Sears customers took delivery of their mail-order cars at the nearest railroad depot. / THF204974
Krotz finished his final prototypes in 1908, and Sears began promoting the cars before the year was out. Soon, catalogs featured Item #21R333, a two-seat Sears Motor Buggy priced at $395. For mail-order customers, the Sears car was shipped, partially disassembled, in a wooden crate. The 1,400-pound package was too heavy for doorstep delivery, so the buyer arranged to receive it at the nearest railroad freight depot. Upon opening the crate, the new owner found instructions detailing how to attach the wheels, add motor oil (provided by Sears), fill the tank with gasoline (provided by the buyer) and drive the little runabout home.
Sears’ Motor Buggy featured a two-cylinder, air-cooled engine good for about 14 horsepower — a perfectly respectable number in 1908. The transmission employed a friction drive that made up for in simplicity what it lacked in efficiency. Final drive to the rear wheels was by chain. Steering was controlled by a tiller, which also contained controls for the spark and accelerator. Top speed was around 25 miles per hour — another reasonable figure for the time.
Within a few years, the Sears automobile line expanded to six models:
- Model G, the bare-bones economy version priced at $370.
- Model H, which added a top, side curtains and fenders for $395.
- Model J, adding running boards for $410.
- Model K, essentially a Model J with upgraded solid tires and priced at $475.
- Model L, a Model J with pneumatic tires priced at $495.
- Model M, a Model K with a more weather-tight body for $525.
Sears treated its Motor Buggies as loss leaders. The company never made much money on them, but they added prestige to the brand, and they certainly brought publicity to the company and its catalog. Rather astonishingly, Sears backed its automobiles with an unconditional lifetime guarantee. By all accounts, Sears automobiles were well made by the standards of the day, and reportedly fewer than two percent of buyers ever returned their cars to the company.
Ford’s Model T offered the same advantages of simplicity and durability, and it drew away many of Sears’s would-be car customers. / THF131520
But the Sears Motor Buggy — indeed, the high-wheel design itself — couldn’t go on forever. By 1912, Ford’s technologically superior Model T had claimed most of the entry-level customers for whom the Sears Motor Buggy was designed. Sears accountants, too, realized that the company’s cars were too much “loss” and not enough “leader.” Production ended after four years and about 3,500 motor buggies were built and sold. If nothing else, Sears, Roebuck & Company had put its name and reputation behind the emerging automobile — no small thing in those early years of the 20th century.
Matt Anderson is curator of transportation at The Henry Ford.
