Sears says it will close an additional 26 stores in October as part of an effort by parent company Transform Holdco to return the retail chain to profitability.
The stores, listed here, include five Kmarts.
Sears Auto Centers, which operates at all but one of the Sears store sites, will close this month. Liquidation sales are expected to begin sometime around Aug. 15, the company says.
Five Kmarts are among the stores closing
Sears Holdings emerged from bankruptcy this year, when former CEO Eddie Lampert acquired about 400 Sears and Kmart stores in a $5 billion deal.
“Over the past several months, we have worked hard to strengthen our vendor relationships, return our inventory levels to normal and improve customer satisfaction and operations,” the company said in a statement on its website Monday evening. “However, we have faced a number of challenges returning our stores to sustainable levels of productivity, including differences with Sears Holdings over our purchase agreement and a generally weak retail environment. These challenges have unfortunately affected our performance and limited our strategic choices."
The company notes that more closures could be on the way.
“Following these steps, we will continue to evaluate our network of Sears and Kmart stores and cannot rule out additional store closures in the near term,” the statement reads.
But there was one bright note: “We believe the right course for the company is to accelerate the expansion of our smaller store formats, which includes opening additional Home & Life stores and adding several hundred Sears Hometown stores after the Sears Hometown & Outlet transaction closes.”
By Edmund Mander
Director, Editor-In-Chief/SCT
