Best Buy permanently closed 10 stores this month – leaving it with 100 fewer stores than before the pandemic.
The 10 all closed on March 2, in addition to another 24 that the retailer closed during the fiscal year that ended on February 3.
The electronics giant is the last to close stores this year – or to announce plans to do so. Walmart has closed three in 2024 and will close three more within weeks.
Meanwhile, Dollar Tree has announced plans to close 1,000, Macy’s has said it will cut 150 — a third of the total — and drugstore Rite Aid is closing 77.
Last year, major US chains including Target, CVS, Macy’s and Rite Aid were responsible for nearly 3,000 store closures by 2023.
(Scroll down for a complete list of the ten Best Buy stores that closed)
There were closures in New York, Minnesota, Utah, Illinois, Ohio, Colorado, Florida, Virginia, Missouri and New Jersey
Best Buy CEO Corie Barry (pictured) said last year that the company had closed 100 stores in the past five years and that the closures would continue
Best Buy’s store count is now down to about 950 in the United States — about 100 fewer than five years ago.
Best Buy bosses said in an earnings call last month that the electronics giant was not renewing some store leases in response to customers’ changing shopping habits.
Closures were spread across the country: in New York, Minnesota, Utah, Illinois, Ohio, Colorado, Florida, Virginia, Missouri and New Jersey.
“We will continue to close existing traditional stores during our rigorous review of stores as their leases come up for renewal,” Chief Financial Officer Matt Bilunas said.
He suggested the retailer could close a further five stores in the coming year, in addition to the most recent string of ten.
The closures were accompanied by significant layoffs last year to right-size operations.
Best Buy’s fourth-quarter sales fell less than 1 percent to $14.6 billion, but comparable sales fell nearly 5 percent during the holiday quarter.
The company has seen reduced demand for electronic goods – particularly TVs, speakers and computers – after the pandemic caused a spike in consumer spending.
Nevertheless, the latest closures are part of an ongoing trend.
“Over the past five years, we have closed approximately 100 Best Buy stores, which represents a 10 percent decline in store count over that period,” CEO Corie Barry told analysts on a conference call last fall.
Bilunas added during the most recent call that Best Buy plans to open some smaller stores in the areas where larger stores are absent – either because they were closed or because they never existed.
“We plan to open a few additional outlet centers and new formats to continue testing two important concepts,” he said.
Best Buy permanently closed ten stores in the US on March 2
“First, we will open small locations in a few out-of-state markets where we have not previously had a physical presence,” he added.
“Second, we will test our ability to close a big box store and open a small box store nearby, maximizing brick-and-mortar store retention through convenience.”
In January of this year, Best Buy stopped selling DVDs and Blu-rays due to the shift in the way consumers watch movies and TV shows.
The decision to stop selling DVDs and Blu-rays in stores was made in October, but the departments were closed after the holidays.
This move leaves Walmart, Amazon and Target as the main retailers now stocking the discs.