Shopko closing 39 stores

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Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by Super S »

https://www.wbay.com/content/news/Shopk ... 78241.html

Most of these are the small format "Shopko Hometown" stores.

This chain seems to be just limping along....
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by SamSpade »

Larger stores:
Lincoln, NE: Speaking as someone that was in this community earlier this year, the city is doing well. There are 4 stores here, so perhaps it's just an acknowledgment of their shrinking market share in the community.

One store is near the mall, the other at a major intersection sandwiched between a Home Depot and Menards. 2 are on the south end of the community.

Lincoln is one of those places you can drive a long time and still be in Lincoln.

Spokane, WA: 2 stores, very far apart (north end / south end) plus one in "the Valley" (Spokane Valley, Wa is its own city) Interestingly enough, looks like Target is in almost the exact same locations.

Small stores:
Bonners Ferry, ID: Well, this little town really does seem to struggle to keep anything besides a grocer open. Sandpoint is just too close & Canadians don't cross-border shop as much anymore.

Delta, Nephi, Blanding, Beaver, UT: Small rural communities. Perhaps the impact of Amazon Prime, Walmart, Target 2-day shipping is taking its toll. Just as easy to make one stop at the post office for everything than to go into another store. I think many of these are former Duckwall-ALCO locations. Luckily Moab stays open!
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by storewanderer »

I haven't looked but the real problem is probably that Dollar General and/or Family Dollar opened in these same little towns and drastically undercut Shopko's pricing and selection on consumable items.

I think Alco was also probably stronger on consumables than Shopko is. That is a very weak area for Shopko and has been for decades.

Shopko certainly runs a higher quality store than Dollar General or Family Dollar but they are a lot more expensive.
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by SamSpade »

True, SW!
All 4 Utah communities appeared to have a nearby Dollar General or Family Dollar. I suppose with the continued changes in pharmacy for most Americans (forced mail order for example) meant that even that department couldn't keep these Hometown stores going.
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by mbz321 »

Rumor is they are preparing to file Chapter 11.
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

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mbz321 wrote: December 7th, 2018, 9:33 pm Rumor is they are preparing to file Chapter 11.
They made it about 15 years longer than I would have thought. Shopko exited Reno years ago; they had two stores that they built in the late 80's left and one did pretty well (by Shopko standards, that means they actually had enough traffic to warrant having two cash registers open sometimes) but the other was struggling. Both were quickly refilled, one by Kohl's and one by Whole Foods/Sierra Trading Post. There was previously a Shopko in Sparks in a former Grand Central building which closed a couple years before the Reno ones, as I understand that one they opted to not renew the lease for performance reasons (wasn't a great part of town). That building sat vacant for about a decade before the property owner finally gave up, quit maintaining it, and demolished it.

The funny thing is when I go into a Shopko today I see that same store that used to operate in Reno 15-20 years ago. The same not so well stocked shelves. The same clean store. The same literally empty of customers situation. The same high pricing. The same shelf tags and sale signs.

It seems like they ramped up expansion of Shopko Hometown format stores the past few years after Alco went out of business, taking some former Alcos but also moving with new builds in some very small towns. Without a sound consumables strategy and with just flat outrageous general merchandise pricing (the merchandise was decent quality; I have some really nice kitchen towels I picked up in Bonners Ferry a year ago at 75% off which still cost $2+ and some nice bowls I picked up in some other place in the middle of corn fields somewhere too at 70% off which also still cost $2+), I have no idea what they were thinking. They obviously tried to expand in areas where it would be cheap and easy to expand. The problem is their store is not cheap in price or quality.
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by Andrew T. »

I'm surprised that they're only closing one store on their Wisconsin home turf.

I don't know how much future is left for this chain, though. Shopko Hometown was probably a mistake in the first place: These stores couldn't have done large volumes, and if Pamida and Alco couldn't keep them going, why did Shopko think they could? Their far-flung and thinly-spread western operations quite frankly confuse me, and supplying them must be a logistics nightmare. As for Shopko's base of regular stores in the upper midwest, they always seemed to be clean, well-stocked...and devoid of people. It's a shame, since they're basically the last regional discount chain standing.
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by Super S »

Andrew T. wrote: December 8th, 2018, 12:11 pm I'm surprised that they're only closing one store on their Wisconsin home turf.

I don't know how much future is left for this chain, though. Shopko Hometown was probably a mistake in the first place: These stores couldn't have done large volumes, and if Pamida and Alco couldn't keep them going, why did Shopko think they could? Their far-flung and thinly-spread western operations quite frankly confuse me, and supplying them must be a logistics nightmare. As for Shopko's base of regular stores in the upper midwest, they always seemed to be clean, well-stocked...and devoid of people. It's a shame, since they're basically the last regional discount chain standing.
Shopko has (or at least had) a distribution facility in Boise which could serve those western stores. But those western operations seem to concentrate on central/eastern Washington and Oregon, the exception being the stores in Lacey and Salem. It almost seems as if Shopko was planning more stores on the west side of the Cascades, but abandoned those plans at some point. The Salem store at least received a remodel at one point which included new lighting, but Lacey, as I mentioned in another thread some time ago, has the feeling of what would result if Kmart took over a mid-1990s Target.

Shopko does find itself in a unique position right now. Not only are they one of the last regional discount chains standing, (Fred Meyer qualifies as one to some extent even though Kroger owns them) but there is a very real possibility that they will outlive Kmart at this point. This could work in Shopko's favor. There are several areas where Kmart has already left where Shopko operates such as Lacey, Salem, Yakima, Boise, Pocatello, and Nampa, and probably a few others. Shopko could fill the void a bit if they could get pricing to a better level. While Walmart as well as Target is present in most if not all of those markets, Shopko stores in general seem a little better organized and in some areas offers better quality. I would like to see Shopko survive.
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by storewanderer »

Shopko's expansion strategy in the western US is a little weird. But they still have 12 full size stores in Utah and close to that number of full size stores in Idaho too. Add in the full size WA Stores and OR Stores (probably another 10-15 stores) too and they actually have more stores than it appears. I think that expansion was mostly done in the late 80's and early 90's when Supervalu owned them, and seemed to stop pretty quickly after Supervalu stopped owning them. I think their distribution center is/was in Boise. It seems like they found places within about 8-10 hours of Boise and went for those places. They previously operated in places like Fort Collins, CO (but I don't think they ever got into Denver suburbs). That lone store in Redding, CA was the only store they ever opened in CA.
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Re: Shopko closing 39 stores

Post by storewanderer »

Super S wrote: December 8th, 2018, 8:36 pm
Andrew T. wrote: December 8th, 2018, 12:11 pm I'm surprised that they're only closing one store on their Wisconsin home turf.

I don't know how much future is left for this chain, though. Shopko Hometown was probably a mistake in the first place: These stores couldn't have done large volumes, and if Pamida and Alco couldn't keep them going, why did Shopko think they could? Their far-flung and thinly-spread western operations quite frankly confuse me, and supplying them must be a logistics nightmare. As for Shopko's base of regular stores in the upper midwest, they always seemed to be clean, well-stocked...and devoid of people. It's a shame, since they're basically the last regional discount chain standing.
Shopko has (or at least had) a distribution facility in Boise which could serve those western stores. But those western operations seem to concentrate on central/eastern Washington and Oregon, the exception being the stores in Lacey and Salem. It almost seems as if Shopko was planning more stores on the west side of the Cascades, but abandoned those plans at some point. The Salem store at least received a remodel at one point which included new lighting, but Lacey, as I mentioned in another thread some time ago, has the feeling of what would result if Kmart took over a mid-1990s Target.

Shopko does find itself in a unique position right now. Not only are they one of the last regional discount chains standing, (Fred Meyer qualifies as one to some extent even though Kroger owns them) but there is a very real possibility that they will outlive Kmart at this point. This could work in Shopko's favor. There are several areas where Kmart has already left where Shopko operates such as Lacey, Salem, Yakima, Boise, Pocatello, and Nampa, and probably a few others. Shopko could fill the void a bit if they could get pricing to a better level. While Walmart as well as Target is present in most if not all of those markets, Shopko stores in general seem a little better organized and in some areas offers better quality. I would like to see Shopko survive.
I just checked and the distribution center is open in Boise. One of the few distribution centers I've seen with mostly positive Google Reviews.

The Redding Shopko was remodeled 10-15 years ago when they had some former Fred Meyer executives running the company; it looks like a Fred Meyer inside.

I read about a small town Shopko Hometown closing in some plains state that is two years old and it says Shopko spent $3 million to build this 25,000 square foot pre-fab building store. That is pretty crazy for that type of a building, with cement floors inside, etc. I think the recent "expansion" of the Shopko Hometown format appears to have doomed the company. Somehow that fleet of former Pamida Stores and the larger format Shopkos was able to hold its own. But adding on 20 former Alcos plus an indeterminate (20-30?) number of new build Shopko Hometown Stores in the past few years appears to have been more financial strain than the company could handle. And that is too bad.

I too would like to see them survive.
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