I'm a customer...I do NOT live anywhere close to Nebraska...but have been following the demise of one of my favorite retailers closely for a few years (and watching this board every now and then).
I'm sure that one thing leading to this decision is the fact that sales have drastically slumped since Bass Pro acquired the rights to Cablea's. Go into ANY store and look at the selection. Most, if not all, items have been replaced with lower quality Bass Pro branded items. If you are able to find a Cabela's item, it's probably a clearance item.
Cabela's had a strong customer following which has been alienated. Many will never return to the new company as it now stands. The last sentence, "...while maintaining an obligation to customers" is somewhat of a joke. It must be. How can you claim that, while at the same time, destroying a trusted brand, eliminating product and raising prices? Customers are not stupid; I'm not stupid. They claim, "restructuring its distribution network to ... better compete with e-commerce companies such as Amazon." That is a pipe dream; they will never compete with Amazon since most products are available on Amazon at substantially lower prices AND free shipping...All except the Bass Pro brands. Cabela's stores have become just another outlet for Bass Pro to push their branded merchandise. No one in their right mind would ever go the Bass Pro or Cabela's to buy name brand stuff; its too over priced.
I don't know how you can purchase a company for over 5 billion dollars and then COMPLETELY ignore it's source of income (the customer). I expect many more announcements like this in the following months and years as the company tries to compensate for their bad decisions.
Thought this was a good post from @XXMh2Mr-1ddq that provides an outside view of the company, and in a lot of cases that is more realistic than what we see from the inside.