By Joshua Burd
Three Macy’s stores in New Jersey are among nearly 70 that will close nationwide this year, as the department store giant looks to streamline its costs and rethink its real estate strategy.
The company on Wednesday identified stores in Wayne, Voorhees and Moorestown that are slated to cease operations early this spring. They are part of a plan announced last summer to close roughly 100 stores, but most of the exact locations had not been disclosed at the time.
The locations in New Jersey include:
- 400 West Route 38 in Moorestown, a 200,000-square-foot store in the Moorestown Mall that opened in 1999
- 6003 Voorhees Town Center in Voorhees, a 224,000-square-foot store that opened in 1970
- Preakness Shopping Center on Hamburg Turnpike in Wayne, an 81,000-square-foot store that opened in 1963
The 68 stores are among 730 within the footprint of the iconic retailer, which has seen in-store sales continue to decline. In its announcement, Macy’s said the closings are estimated to generate annual savings of about $550 million starting this year, “enabling the company to invest an additional $250 million in growing the digital business, store-related growth strategies, Bluemercury, Macy’s Backstage and China.”
“Over the past year, we have been focused and disciplined about making strategic decisions to position us to gain market share and return to growth over time,” Terry J. Lundgren, chairman and CEO of Macy’s Inc., said in a prepared statement. “While we are pleased with the strong performance of our highly developed online business, as well as the progress we have made on selling and visual presentation programs and expense reduction initiatives in 2016, we continue to experience declining traffic in our stores where the majority of our business is still transacted.
“Given the overall trends challenging us and the broader retail industry, and the time needed to execute new strategies, we expect our 2017 change in comparable sales to be relatively consistent with our November/December sales trend.”
He added that the company’s “omnichannel strategies continue to evolve based on the changes in our customers’ shopping behaviors,” citing a focus on buying online, picking up in store and mobile-enabled shopping.
Macy’s announcement came Wednesday as Sears Holdings announced it would close four Kmart locations in New Jersey, including sites in Clementon, East Brunswick, Pleasantville and Rio Grande. Published reports say they are among 150 Kmart and Sears stores slated to be shut down.