Several Bed Bath & Beyond stores in Oklahoma to close
With sales down and costs up, several Oklahoma Bed Bath & Beyond stores’ days are numbered.
When the kitchen axe will fall isn’t known publicly. A manager at the store in Moore referred questions to company headquarters in Union, New Jersey, and no one there returned a request for comment.
But these Bed Bath & Beyond stores in Oklahoma are on the butcher block:
● 2150 S Service Road, Shops at Moore, Moore.
● 620 Ed Noble Parkway, Parkway Plaza, Norman.
● 5352 E Skelly Drive, Tulsa.
● 7410 S Olympia Ave., Tulsa Hills Shopping Center, Tulsa.
Two Oklahoma stores are safe, for now:
● 412 S Bryant Ave., Bryant Square Shopping Center, Edmond.
● 2848 NW 63, French Market, Oklahoma City. In all, Bed Bath & Beyond has closed, or announced plans to close, 440 of the 949 stores it had open at the start of the last holiday shopping season, as well as its nearly 800,000-square-foot warehouse in suburban Dallas, according to CoStar News.
The closing stores include Buy Buy Baby and Harmon locations owned by Bed Bath & Beyond.
The closings will cost Oklahoma from 160 to 240 jobs. A typical Bed Bath & Beyond employs between 40 and 60 people, said Janet Yowell, executive director of the Edmond Economic Development Authority.
Why Bed Bath & Beyond stores in OKC and Edmond are safe for now
Why would the stores in Norman, Moore and two in Tulsa get the axe, but not the ones in Edmond and on NW 63?
“Profitability,” said Sam Swanson, director and vice president of retail for OKC property brokerage NAI Sullivan Group. “We’ve heard rumors for months now about BB&B closures, and the weak links are shuttering first.
“Corporate BB&B will do and have been doing everything they can to prevent from closing stores, but clearly these first 150 locations nationally have been sinking company profits, and reducing store count is a goal to reduce overhead.”
Put bluntly, “At this point, it’s all about sales and survival,” said Jim Parrack, senior vice president and retail specialist with Price Edwards & Co.
What happened to get Bed Bath & Beyond in such financial trouble?
Parrack said some of Bed Bath & Beyond’s wounds are “self-inflicted.”
“They went away from name brands, opting for in-house brands. They ‘cluttered’ their stores. Competition in the home goods sector increased significantly. And, they borrowed too much money,” he said.
“At the end of the day, Bed, Bath & Beyond lost touch with their customer, and management hasn’t been able to get it back.
“The turnaround plan isn’t pretty – cutting 20% of the workforce, closing another 150 stores, going back to name brands, borrowing more money. There is significant doubt if it will work without bankruptcy.”
Swanson said the chain, among others, has long struggled to keep its bricks-and-mortar stores competitive with online shopping.
“Retailers like Bed Bath & Beyond, Party City, Tuesday Morning, etc., have been struggling for years trying to keep up with Amazon pricing/convenience while operating in large expensive retail footprints. COVID government aid masked those troubled, and bought time for these struggling, retailers,” he said.