Dressbarn will shutter all 650 of its stores,CNBCreports.
Owner of the women’s clothing store Ascena Retail Group announced on Monday that it plans to close the stores in order to concentrate on its more profitable brands, like Ann Taylor and Loft. “Dressbarn chain has not been operating at an acceptable level of profitability in today’s retail environment,” Dressbarn CFO Steven Taylor said in a press release.
Customers will still be able to shop from Dressbarn from stores and online, since the closures won’t happen immediately. A timeline for the stores’ termination hasn’t yet been mapped out.
Ascena’s announcement comes on the heels of a number of store closures that have already taken place this year. Over 6,000 stores will shutter in 2019, locations from Payless ShoeSource, Gymboree, Charlotte Russe, Victoria’s Secret, and Gap. That’s more closures than 2018, when 5,864 stores were shut down during the entire year, according to CNBC.
Though Dressbarn has been open for over 50 years, it has had a difficult time growing in a retail climate where women are looking to fast-fashion stores like H&M and Zara, chains like TJ Maxx and Ross Stores, and even Target and Amazon, the latter of which continues to take a bigger share of the online apparel market.
