The department store sector was already one that was struggling, and then the conronavirus arrived…
Every department store in America, from the low end to the high, has tried some way to drag the retail concept into the 21st century. It’s a monumental task, considering the model was born in the 1800s, and enjoyed its last heyday in the 1950s. The effort has had mixed results. Now COVID-19 has introduced new urgency, and possibly new goals.
With physical locations contributing zero sales and e-commerce too feeble to make up for it, Nordstrom, Macy’s, J.C. Penney and Kohl’s have all taken desperate measures, pulling financial levers like draw-downs of their credit revolvers, hitting the brakes on growth plans, furloughing most of their workforces and even potentially skipping on rent. Neiman Marcus and Southern department store Belk have joined the others in furloughing workers and temporarily cutting pay.
But the main problem for the sector is that there wasn’t much of a place for department stores before COVID-19. As devastating as it has been to retail as a whole and this segment specifically, the outbreak is only partly to blame for department stores’ current woes or for the predicament that awaits them once it subsides, analysts have said
