Macy’s has announced plans to close 35 to 40 “underperforming” stores in early 2016, although it did not identify which stores will shut down permanently.
The locations “will be announced at a later date, once the company completes a careful analysis now under way and makes final decisions,” Macy’s officials said in a release.
Macy’s, which has corporate offices in Cincinnati and New York, operates retail stores in the Mall at Fairfield Commons in Beavercreek and the Dayton Mall in Miami Twp., as well as six Cincinnati-area stores include locations in the Tri-County Mall, Northgate Mall and Kenwood Towne Center. It also operates a customer-service center in Mason, one of four such centers across the country.
Macy’s closed its retail store in the Upper Valley Mall in Springfield earlier this year.
The company said it would inform employees at the affected stores prior to a public announcement, and those impacted “may be offered positions in nearby stores where possible,” the Macy’s release said. Eligible full-time and part-time associates who are laid off due to the store closing will be offered severance benefits, company officials said.
“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,” Terry J. Lundgren, Macy’s, Inc. chairman and CEO, said in a release.
“Physical stores remain absolutely vital to our omni-channel strategy, which provides local touchpoints and tailored merchandise assortments for shoppers in nearly every major market. As new shopping centers 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 centers,” Lundgren said.
“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.”
Macy’s, Inc. today operates 770 Macy’s stores. Over the past five years (2010 through 2015 to date), 52 Macy’s stores have been closed and 12 new Macy’s stores have been opened.