J.C. Penney to begin permanent store closures

J.C. Penney will be permanently closing 154 stores and will pursue other store liquidations as part of its Chapter 11 Bankruptcy plan. J.C. Penney filed for bankruptcy on May 15, and is now doing its best to emerge from this filing as financially stable as possible.

Stores expected to be permanently closed include nine in California, nine in Ohio, eight in Indiana, eight in Florida, seven in Georgia, seven in New York, seven in Texas, six in Kentucky, six in Oklahoma, four in Alabama, six in South Carolina, and six in Tennessee. Store closures are expected to take 10-16 weeks to complete. Once these store closures are complete J.C. Penney plans to redirect their efforts toward high performing stores and their e-commerce jcp.com.

“While closing stores is always an extremely difficult decision, our store optimization strategy is vital to ensuring we emerge from both Chapter 11 and the COVID-19 pandemic as a stronger retailer with greater financial flexibility to allow us to continue serving our loyal customers for decades to come,” said Jill Soltau, chief executive officer of JCPenney, in a statement. “I am incredibly grateful to our talented associates for their ongoing dedication and their passion for meeting and exceeding our customers’ expectations during this difficult and uncertain time. All impacted associates will be treated with the utmost consideration and respect.”

She added that, “We will remain one of the nation’s largest apparel and home retailers as we continue to operate a majority of our stores and our flagship store, jcp.com, to ensure our valued customers continue to have access to the products and brands they need and want. As of June 4, 2020, we have reopened nearly 500 stores since government officials have eased COVID-19 restrictions and we look forward to opening more. We are excited to welcome back our customers and associates at these locations, and we will continue to take actions to be best positioned to build on our over 100-year history.”

As of this week, J.C. Penney has opened 500 stores in its current fleet of stores as state governments have begun lifting lockdown restrictions after coronavirus. J.C. Penney was struggling financially before the coronavirus crisis, and the temporary store closures just worsened their situation as they lost sales from brick-and-mortar.

photo: courtesy of J.C. Penney Newsroom