This article is from the Australian Property Journal archive
MAJOR department store Myer is shutting its Blacktown store in Sydney’s west as it furthers plans to slash 20% of its property portfolio.
It follows the closure of stores in Logan in 2019, Hornsby and Emporium in 2020 and Knox in August last year, while space reductions and improvements have also been undertaken at Belconnen, Cairns, Morley and Highpoint, with reduction works underway at Toowoomba.
“Today’s decision continues to deliver against our Customer First Plan and we will continue to make targeted improvements to our store network, reducing space and improving the offer for our loyal customers,” Myer’s CEO, John King said.
The reduced floor space could amount to 100,000 sqm across the country.
“In making this decision today, we have taken into account our strengthening online sales, as well as the number of Myer stores that are in close proximity to the Blacktown store, including Castle Hill, Parramatta, Bankstown and Roselands.”
Myer, which releases its half-year results in March, previously said in an update that the Omicron wave impacted trading during January, although its sales in the five months to the end of December were 12.3% higher than the prior corresponding period.
About 27% of trading days were lost in that five-month period to due lockdowns in Sydney and Melbourne. However, its growing online sales lifted another 54% and made up almost 28% of total sales, up from just over 20%.
The Blacktown closure may raise the ire of major shareholder, retail billionaire Solomon Lew’s Premier Investments, which has recently upped its stake to nearly 20%. Lew has made multiple attempts to take down the Myer board, including at last year’s annual general meeting where investors slapped the board with a second strike against its remuneration report.
Lew made a $100 million investment in Myer in 2017 when the share price was at $1.15. It has fallen as low as 19c as it was smashed by retail headwinds prior to the pandemic, and closed yesterday at 41c. Myer returned to profit for the 2021 full year as it posted a much stronger set of numbers.
The Blacktown store will cease trading on Sunday, 3rd April.
