Wal Mart is doing some rare pruning. that includes all of its locations under its smallest format concept store called Wal Mart Express. The other big chunk is in its challenging Brazilian market.
The stores being shuttered account for a fraction of the company 11,000 stores worldwide and less than 1 per cent of its global revenue. Wal Mart Stores Inc. alone.
The store closures will start at the end of the month.
The announcement comes three months after Wal Mart Stores Inc.
managing our portfolio of assets is essential to maintaining a healthy business, McMillon said in a statement. stores is never an easy decision. But it is necessary to keep the company strong and positioned for the future. cheap nfl jerseys Exstein, an analyst at Credit Suisse, described the moves as steps in his report published Friday, but he believes they are positive ones. He noted that this is the first mass closing that Wal Mart has announced in at least two decades.
is a sign that Wal Mart has begun the process of dealing with unproductive locations in a much more tangible and coherent way, he wrote. we continue to believe that Wal Mart needs a much larger restructuring of its store base in order to narrow its focus as it seeks to improve its sales and returns, especially internationally. business. But it warned last October that its earnings for the fiscal year starting next month will be down as much as 12 per cent as it invests further in online operations and pours money into improving customers experience in the stores. The company has been building bigger fulfilmentcentres devoted to e commerce orders and expanding online services.
Wal Mart Express marked the retailer first entry into the convenience store arena. The stores, which sold essentials like toothpaste, were meant to be a solution to the threat of the fast growing dollar stores. Wal Mart Express intended to be a two pronged strategy: stores in small towns that aren big enough to support a full size Wal Mart and stores in big cities where building a supercenter was impractical. But the concept never caught on as the stores served the same purpose as Wal Mart larger Neighborhood Markets: fill in trips and prescription pickups.
Also covered in the closures are 23 Neighborhood Markets, 12 supercenters, seven stores in Puerto Rico, six discount stores and four Sam Clubs. are within 10 miles of another Wal Mart. The Bentonville, Arkansas, company said it is working to ensure that workers are placed in nearby locations. on supercenters, Neighborhood Markets, the e commerce business and pickup services for shoppers.
The retailer said it also closed 60 loss making locations in Brazil, which accounts for 5 per cent of sales in that market. Wal Mart, which operated 558 stores in Brazil before the closures, has struggled as the economy there has soured. Its Every Day Low price strategy has also not been able to break against heavy promotions from key rivals.
The remaining 55 stores are spread elsewhere in Latin America.
The financial impact of the closures is expected to be 20 cents to 22 cents per share from continuing operations, with about 19 cents to 20 cents expected to affect the current fourth quarter. The company is scheduled to release fourth quarter and full year results on Feb. 18.
In a separate move, Wal Mart said that it merging its Arkansas based team that creates technology for its stores with its Silicon Valley team that does the same for e commerce. https://www.cheapnflauthenticjerseys.top/ The move is expected to help Wal Mart create a more seamless shopping experience for customers who are jumping back and forth between stores and their mobile phones.