Shopko, the Green Bay, Wis.-based discount chain and 69th largest CE retailer, is going down for the count.
After filing for bankruptcy in January, and announcing plans last month to cull its store base by 70 percent, the regional retailer cancelled a planned auction this week for lack of interested buyers.
Instead, it will begin liquidation sales and close its several hundred remaining locations by June 16.
“This is not the outcome that we had hoped for when we started our restructuring efforts,” CEO Russ Steinhorst said in a statement.
Related: Retail Retrenchment In 2018
Shopko began out of single Green Bay location in 1962. It became one of the first discount chains to package a pharmacy and eye center with general merchandise, and flourished amid the growth of national discounters Walmart and Kmart by providing a higher quality assortment to its Midwest customer base. It was taken private in 2005 by investment firm Sun Capital Partners, which later merged it with another retail holding Pamida.
At its height, the combined operation had 350 locations in 22 states and more than 20,000 employees, and a CE business comprised of opening-price-point A/V, wearables, accessories and other promotional fare. At last count it sold $45 million in consumer tech in 2017, according to TWICE’s Top 100 CE Retailers Report.
Shopko joins Payless ShoeSource and Gymboree as the first retail casualties of 2019, as the brick-and-mortar landscape continues to contract.
