GNC files for bankruptcy, will close up to 1,200 stores

Vitamin and nutrition chain GNC Holdings filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy this week, with plans to close up to 1,200 of its 5,200 U.S. stores as it searches for a buyer.

GNC — General Nutrition Centers — has struggled for years to shore up sales as it tried to pay back more than $900 million in debt. Then came the coronavirus pandemic, which forced it to shutter about 40 percent of its stores, leading to millions in lost revenue. The company reported a $200 million loss during the first quarter of this year and last month warned that some of the company’s temporary closures could soon turn permanent.

GNC has one Santa Fe location at Plaza Entrada.

The company’s bankruptcy filing comes days after it paid nearly $4 million in cash bonuses to top executives, including CEO Kenneth Martindale, who received $2.2 million. Four other executives, including the company’s chief financial officer and chief human resource officer, received a combined $1.7 billion in bonuses, according to company documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday.

The bonuses were paid out June 18, five days before the bankruptcy filing. Executives will have to pay back 25 percent of their bonuses if the company does not emerge from bankruptcy within a year, according to the filing.

The chain, founded in 1935 in Pittsburgh, is the sixth major U.S. retailer to file for bankruptcy protection during the COVID-19 pandemic, which has already led to thousands of permanent store closures and billions in lost sales across the industry.

In its bankruptcy filing Tuesday, GNC said it had both assets and liabilities between $1 billion and $10 billion. Annual revenue fell 12 percent last year to $2.07 billion. GNC has 5,200 U.S. stores, as well as 1,600 pop-ups at Rite Aid pharmacies.

Shares of the company’s stock tumbled more than 25 percent Wednesday to about 60 cents per share, down from a peak of $60 in 2013. Shares are down nearly 80 percent so far this year.