Saturday, May 25, 2019

Shopko liquidating, a tale of the Retail Apocalypse


I made a conditional promise to close out Retail Archeology looks at Family Dollar, a tale of the Retail Apocalypse.
Not good news is what International Business Times reported about Shopko.
After filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, Shopko said it will close all of its store locations by June 16. The closures affect 360 stores in 26 states.
Unless something more dramatic intervenes, I know which tale of the Retail Apocalypse I'm telling next.
Something more dramatic did intervene, which is why I wrote Dressbarn closing all 650 stores, a tale of the Retail Apocalypse.  I also promised that "Pinterest and comments on the blog [are] coming up next."  As it turns out, the most commented posts are about the Retail Apocalypse, so I can fulfill both promises by writing about Shopko's demise followed by a retrospective over the jump.

I begin the story of Shopko's demise with Shopko closing all of its stores from NBC 26 in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where Shopko began.

Liquidation of all of Shopko's stores is expected to finish by June.
That was in March, when Shopko's bankruptcy, which I first mentioned in February's Sears and KMart avoid liquidation, a tale of the Retail Apocalypse, turned into a liquidation.

NBC 26 followed up by asking What comes next for Shopko workers?.

More than 2,000 people across Wisconsin will lose their jobs later this year when Shopko stores and a distribution center close their doors.
NBC 26 continued its coverage by reporting on the closure of the store in DePere, which was the site of the previous segment.


At least Kim Flom, who is in charge of economic development for the city of DePere, displays some optimism about redeveloping the property, which includes a Payless ShoeSource.  One the one hand, that makes her another Crazy Eddie, which she should take as a compliment from me.  On the other, she'll need it.

All of the above is about what's happening this year.  For the history of the chain, including how it ended up liquidating, I'm turning to Brick Immortar's Shopko - Another Major Retailer... Bankrupt: Lifeless Retail Ep. 04 in which does a poor man's job of being Retail Archaeology, who he follows on Twitter, in the video.

Shopko recently announced the closure of all remaining stores across all "brands" and plans to have this completed by June, 2019. Shopko failed to find a buyer during the lead up to filing chapter 11 bankruptcy so, here we are.

From the late 90's onward, the chain slowly began struggling to find their footing against "the big 3". Updating their identity with ever changing slogans, branding, store closures/remodels/acquistitions and also leadership. This trend continued until their ultimate decline in the present day.
Oh, man, did the changing retail environment clobber Shopko!

Follow over the jump for the two most commented on posts of the eighth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News, both of which are about the Retail Apocalypse.


The most commented on entry from the eighth year of this blog was Business Insider on stores closing in the Retail Apocalypse from June 13, 2018.  It attracted 26 comments, 14 of them during July 2018 for most commented of the month because of spammers.  It did not have enough page views to be included in Company Man on JCPenney's decline updates tales of the Retail Apocalypse for the eighth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News, but it certainly would have fit the theme otherwise.

Speaking of the the retrospective about tales of the Retail Apocalypse for the eighth year of this blog, here's what I wrote about the second most commented on entry.

The 29th most read entry during the eighth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News and the 28th most read actually posted last year was Radio Shack, a tale of the retail apocalypse from Company Man and Retail Archeology from July 6, 2018 with 2493 total raw page views.  The entry was the third most read entry during July 2018 and the most read actually posted that month with 2192 default and 2261 raw page views.  It also earned 9 comments, making it the most commented on entry actually posted during July; Radio Shack's former customers were passionate about the chain! It was also among most active on Twitter that month with 2 retweets and 2 likes.
Both of these entries contributed to the 70 comments the blog received during July 2018.  While that was the high for last year, it wasn't a record; October 2015 saw 74 for starters.

With that, I'm done with the Retail Apocalypse entries from last year, but the Retail Apocalypse rolls on, as does this retrospective series.  Stay tuned for a bonus post about how my pins from this blog fared on Pinterest, which I didn't feel like delaying until Thursday.  That day is reserved for holidays and the back catalog.

Previous posts in this series
Previous retrospectives about comments and likes.

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