RSS
Home
Borders Group to close 60% of all Waldenbooks stores
Print
Email
RSS
Subscribe
In an effort to “right-size” its Waldenbooks Specialty Retail segment and to make the chain profitable, Borders Group plans to close around 200 Waldenbooks and Borders Express stores in mall locations in January. Following the closings, the Waldenbooks Specialty Retail segment will have only around 130 stores in malls. The announcement does not pertain to Borders superstores or its seasonal mall kiosk business.
According to company management, the closings will reduce the number of stores with operating losses, reduce the company’s overall rent expense and lease-adjusted leverage, and generate cash flow through sales and working capital reductions. Stores that remain open will be integrated into the computer system used by Borders superstores, providing mall shoppers with expanded search services and enhanced fulfillment capabilities. Approximately 1,500 positions, most of them part-time, will be eliminated, with efforts being made to replace qualified employees in other parts of Borders Group. Displaced employees will receive severance.
Stores that are tentatively slated for closing in the Boston area include Waldenbooks stores at Westgate Mall (Brockton, MA), Liberty Tree Mall (Danvers, MA), and Solomon Pond Mall (Marlborough, MA); and Borders Express stores at Pheasant Lane Mall (Nashua, NH) and Emerald Square Mall (North Attleborough, MA).
At its peak in the late 1990s, Borders Group operated more than 900 Waldenbooks stores, but has been downsizing the mall chain segment throughout the 2000s. In fiscal 2008, 112 stores were shuttered.
