U.S. retailer GameStop plans to close at least 320 stores in 2020 as it pushes ahead with its “de-densification plan.”<\/p>\n
Breaking the news during a recent earnings call, GameStop executive vice president and chief financial officer Jim Bell said the company anticipates store closes will be “equal to or more than” the 320 net closures it saw in 2019. <\/p>\n
“We continue to focus on optimizing our global store fleet in fiscal 2019 and closed a net total of 321 stores inclusive of 333 closings and 12 openings. In fiscal 2020, we will continue in our efforts to de-densify our store base, focused on maximizing product productivity of the entire fleet,” he said.<\/p>\n
“[We] anticipate store closures to be equal to or more than 320 net closures we saw in fiscal 2019 on a global basis. Importantly, we want to emphasize that these store closures are a very specific and proactive part of our de-densification plan and they are not related to recent business trends.<\/p>\n
Bell said the process has already begun to yield results, and expects the upcoming closures to “positively impact both sales and earnings growth” as sales are transferred to nearby stores.<\/p>\n