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Kmart to close 64 more stores; 7 reported in Michigan

Charisse Jones, USA TODAY

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Sept. 19, 2016

 

 

 

Kmart, the mass-merchandise retail chain struggling with listing sales, is going to close 64 stores across the U.S., a person familiar with the matter said Monday.

According to Business Insider, the Michigan closings include stores in Jackson, Fenton, Manistee, Byron Center, Grand Rapids, Alpena and Sault Ste. Marie.

Liquidation sales will begin on Sept. 22, and the stores will close their doors in mid-December, according to a person familiar with the closings who did not want to be named because they were not allowed to say so publicly.

►Related:With Kmart struggling, closed stores see new life

►Related: After a decade, is deserted Kmart HQ about to be overhauled?

It is the latest round of cuts by the retailer. Its parent company, Sears Holdings, said in April that it would close 68 Kmart stores this summer. Both Sears and Kmart have had a difficult time remaining profitable and competitive in a retail environment increasingly dominated by other mass market chains and e-commerce sites like Amazon.

Many Detroit suburbs where Kmarts have already closed have seen promising redevelopments filling those spaces, the Free Press reported last week.

The latest closures include 17 stores that were among 235 sold last year by Sears Holdings to Seritage. The deal included a provision that allowed Sears Holdings to lease those locations back from Seritage, but to have the option to vacate the lease if the store was losing money.

“As such, we have informed Seritage that we will soon be exiting 17 Kmart stores,” says Sears Holdings spokesman Howard Riefs. “We have been strategically and aggressively evaluating our store space and productivity, and will be accelerating the closing of unprofitable stores as we have previously announced.”

Kmart and Sears are hardly the only traditional brick-and-mortar retailers who are struggling. Macy’s said last month that it would close 100 of its 675 full line locations because of dwindling profits. Sports Authority is shutting all of its 460 stores after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. And Walmart said in January that it was shuttering 269 locations across the globe.

www.freep.com/story/money/business/2016/09/19/kmart-close-stores-reported-michigan/90715668/