Macy's announces 65 store closures this year

Macy's seems to have little to celebrate this holiday season. A time of year that is usually particularly celebratory for the chain, because of its traditional Thanksgiving Day Parade (this year on its 100th anniversary) and the surge in sales due to the holidays, is being overshadowed by a new store closure announcement.

In early 2024 it stated that it would close 50 stores by the end of the year as part of its strategy to focus only on high performers, discarding those that are not doing as well. Its ultimate goal is to close about 150 stores over the next three years.

The company's CEO, Tony Spring, announced this week that they now expect to "close roughly 65 locations this year." "In line with our typical cadence, closures will occur post holiday," he added on a call about third-quarter results, reported by CBS News.

The company reported a 2.4% drop in net sales compared to last year's third quarter. Macy's delayed reporting these figures after discovering that an employee had concealed up to $154 million in expenses through false accounting records.

The internal investigation has been concluded. The company assured that the episode, which occurred between 2021 and 2014, did not impact its revenues or affect suppliers, although they stated that they are strengthening their controls to prevent it from happening again. They also assured that the person responsible is no longer on their staff, but did not detail whether they resigned or were fired, according to CNN.

In addition, according to the same network, the company lowered its profit forecast, resulting in a drop of more than 11% in pre-market trading.