US fashion and beauty retailer Macy’s has announced plans to shut down 35 to 40 of its underperforming stores early next year.
The closure of the stores will represent roughly 1% of the total of Macy’s sales. It has not yet been decided which stores will be closed, pending analysis of store performance, but Macy’s did state it would let affected employees know prior to a public announcement.
The retailer said it had made the decision in order to focus on optimising its omnichannel approach to US customers. Terry Lundgren, Macy’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, said: “Physical stores remain absolutely vital to our omnichannel strategy, which provides local touchpoints and tailored merchandise assortments for shoppers in nearly every major market. As new shopping centres are opened, however, many customers change their shopping habits and often the sales volume of a store gets divided among the new and nearby, existing centres. Each year, we prune some stores that are our weakest performers so that we can concentrate our resources on the best locations and maintain a strong physical presence. At the same time, we open a small number of new stores to fill gaps in our market coverage or where we have outstanding real estate opportunities.”
Lundgren added: “While making the decision to close stores is difficult, we know it is necessary for us to remain competitive as customer shopping patterns continue to change.”
Macy’s operates 770 stores currently; in the past five years 52 Macy’s stores have shut down, while 12 new stores have opened their doors.