STORE closures have been hitting the US recently, with Dollar General and Walgreens dominating the undesired leader board.
Lots of retailers have been forced to close locations in the past few months, but both Dollar General and Walgreens have closed significantly more than they opened recently.
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Supermarket news reported on the unfortunate statistic on February 18.
Dollar General has suffered a spate of poor fortunes, as they go from opening over 60 stores last year to closing nearly half of that total in a month.
The discount chain opened 72 stores in summer 2024, closing only five.
Now, they have had to close 27 and open nine in January.
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This brings the total of openings to 18 and 82 stores closed across the nation in the month.
Walgreens has suffered a similarly poor fate recently, as they saw the closure of 36 stores throughout states in the East Coast, South, and Midwest.
In that time, they opened one store.
Walgreens also closed 58 stores in November and 12 stores in December.
This makes 109 Dollar Generals and Walgreens closed in January combined.
The retail sector in general has been struggling to open to spots, as even competitors report low numbers.
In the past month, CVS has closed three stores, Dollar Tree has opened two and closed four and Walmart closed three spots themselves.
Additionally, Save a Lot closed four and opened two.
The only major retailers to have opened stores without closing any, per Supermarket News’ list, is Albertsons and Whole Foods.
Albertsons opened one new store in January, and Whole Foods opened two.
RETAILER GONE
The US Sun is reporting on store closing across the country.
Recently, Forever 21, the popular fast-fashion retailer operated by Authentic Brands Group and Simon Property Group, has confirmed the closing of its location in Boise, Idaho.
It is located at Boise Towne Square Mall.
An employee at the store confirmed with BoiseDev that the location is due to close.
US braces for ‘45,000 store closures’
Some 45,000 bricks-and-mortar stores could close in the next five years, experts have warned.
Several major retailers have announced store closures or gone out of business altogether in recent years.
In 2023, chains such as Foot Locker announced plans to close up to 400 outlets by 2026.
While, other well-known retailers like Tuesday Morning and Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams filed for bankruptcy in 2023.
Bed Bath & Beyond has closed all of its brick-and-mortar stores and is now an online-only retailer.
The most affected retailers have been clothing, consumer electronics, sporting goods, hobby, book, music, and home furnishing stores since the start of 2019.
UBS has predicted the total number of retail stores will drop by 45k from 958k to 913k.
Despite that, the report says that certain stores should thrive while others decline.
It said retailers such as Walmart, Costco, Home Depot, and Target, could be among the winners.
It was further confirmed that the store is already beginning its liquidation process.
This is part of Forever 21’s bankruptcy process, which will see 200 locations shut for good.
This will leave the company with less than 400 retail locations – down more than half from its peak of at least 800.
Forever 21 was bought by Authentic Brands Group and Simon Property Group in 2020.
Authentic Brands CEO Jamie Salter said in a conference that acquiring Forever 21 was “probably the biggest mistake I made.”
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