"Our business is rapidly evolving in response to changes in the way customers are shopping across stores, desktops, tablets and smartphones," Macy's Chairman and CEO Terry J. Lundgren said.
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Macy's Inc. on Thursday announced it is closing its Richmond Town Square store in Richmond Heights along with 13 other Macy's stores nationwide. Final clearance sales will begin Monday, Jan. 12, and run for eight to 12 weeks, the Cincinnati-based retailer said.
The Richmond Heights store, a 165,000-square-foot store that opened in 1998 and employs 105, is one of three Ohio locations being shuttered. The other two are at Kingsdale Shopping Center in Upper Arlington, near Columbus, with 115 workers, and at Upper Valley Mall in Springfield, between Dayton and Columbus, with 79 workers.
"The company is committed to treating associates affected by store closings with respect and openness," Macy's said in a statement. "Associates displaced by store closings may be offered positions in nearby stores where possible. Eligible full-time and part-time associates who are laid off due to the store closing will be offered severance benefits."
After the closings, Macy's Inc. will operate about 830 stores in 45 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam.
In an unrelated announcement, JCPenney announced it also is closing its store in Upper Valley Mall and cutting 90 workers there some time around April 4.
Penney's is keeping its store at Richmond Town Square, where it will be one of three remaining anchors. The others are Sears and Regal Cinemas. The shopping area was built in the mid-1960s.
A person in the Macy's store manager's office in Richmond Heights Thursday night would not comment on the closing.
The 14 store closings represent less than 2 percent of Macy's 790 locations, but collectively contribute about $130 million in annual sales. But they are part of a companywide restructuring to change merchandising and marketing functions at Macy's and Bloomingdale's and redistribute jobs and resources.
View full sizeMacy's Chairman and CEO Terry J. Lundgren "Our business is rapidly evolving in response to changes in the way customers are shopping across stores, desktops, tablets and smartphones. We must continue to invest in our business to focus on where the customer is headed to prepare for what's next," said Macy's Chairman and Chief Executive Terry J. Lundgren, in a statement.
He said Macy's invested early and aggressively in what it calls its M.O.M. strategies ("My Macy's" localization efforts, Omnichannel selling in-store, online and via mobile, and "Magic Selling" customer engagement.)
"We remain committed to M.O.M. as our strategic roadmap," Lundgren said. "We are continuing to learn from our experiences and to mold our business model and M.O.M. strategies around what our customers are telling us and how they are behaving so that we can continue to succeed in this environment. We are moving quickly.
"In many ways, this is a race to remain best-in-class and to win with the customer. We fully expect to remain an industry leader and innovator," he said.
Macy's will cut jobs in some areas and hire more workers in others, but said that its total workforce will remain at about 175,000. "Going forward, Macy's and Bloomingdale's will be better able to move more quickly and nimbly to select merchandise, assort inventories and serve total customer demand, no matter how, when or where the customer shops," Lundgren said.
Instead of having district planners based on geography, for example, Macy's will create new teams devoted to specific themes, such as warm-weather strategies, customers in northern climate zones, and multicultural shoppers.
Those changes will cut about 115 jobs at Macy's and Bloomingdale's corporate offices in New York, as well as another 150 or so in other markets.
At the store level, Macy's said it will adjust staffing to increase productivity and improve efficiency. "An average of two to three associates will be affected in each of Macy's and Bloomingdale's approximately 830 stores (out of an average workforce of approximately 150 associates in each store), for a total of about 2,200 affected associates nationwide," the company said. It added that it will try to move as many workers as possible into other available jobs.
On the other hand, Macy's said it expects to hire more than 150 people at its San Francisco-based digital technology organization to help improve its digital retail experience.
The retailer also expects to hire up to 1,500 year-round and seasonal workers at 1 1.3 million-square-foot fulfillment center in Tulsa County, Oklahoma, opening this April. It will hire 275 workers for a Macy's store in Ponce, Puerto Rico, and 250 workers for a Bloomingdale's store in Honolulu. Both stores will open this fall.
All of the changes are expected to save the company about $140 million, which it will use to invest in technology and offset higher expected health care and retirement costs.
Plain Dealer Reporter Ron Rutti contributed to this story.
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