Lights out for Circuit City
Consumer electronics retailer Circuit City said it will close three stores in the Tri-Counties as part of a shuttering of 155 locations, or about 20 percent of its U.S. stores.
Locations in Thousand Oaks, Santa Barbara and Santa Maria are slated to be closed and liquidated immediately, the company said.
Richmond, Va.-based Circuit City said it is also renegotiating leases and suspending new store openings, all in an effort to save cash amid a slowed economy. It operates about 720 stores in the U.S.
The Circuit City closings come just two weeks after Hayward-based department store Mervyns and New Jersey-based Linens-N-Things announced nationwide closures that affected the Tri-Counties.
Linens-N-Things, which had operated more than 500 stores at its peak and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May, is liquidating inventory and closing stores in stores in San Luis Obispo, Santa Maria, Goleta and Ventura. Mervyns, which filed for Chapter 11 in July, is closing stores in San Luis Obispo, Santa Maria, Lompoc, Ventura, Oxnard and Thousand Oaks.
As previously reported by the Business Times, Linens-N-Things and Mervyns accounted for about 320,000 square feet of retail space in the Tri-Counties. It’s not yet clear how much space will open up as a result of the Circuit City closing.
Ciruit City has 721 stores and outlets in the U.S. as well as 770 mostly smaller locations in Canada.
For more information about Circuit City’s closures, see the Nov. 7 issue of the business times.
