BREAKING: All US retail stores to close permanently by month’s end | Steve Dennis’ Blog on WordPress.com

In a surprise move that underscores the sweeping changes faced by the retail industry, the National Retail Federation, speaking on behalf of all of its members, announced today that every brick & mortar location of every retailer in the United States would close forever within the next few weeks. For nearly a decade “traditional” retailers have been struggling with profitability as sales shifted online and more consumers started to notice that many retailers appeared to have given up years earlier. Yet the move to close down every single store in America still came as a shock to most industry observers.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a CEO of one major retail brand remarked “I would have thought that the fact that 90% of all shopping is still done in physical locations would have been enough to warrant keeping at least a few stores around. I guess I was wrong.” Former Texas Governor Rick Perry, who was recently named Sears’ 13th CEO in as many months, seemed surprised as well. “Wait, most shopping is still done in stores? I guess maybe we should have worked on making our stores better rather than thinking that closing them down would somehow make things better? Oops.”

Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, the brand that has benefitted the most from consumers’ growing love of e-commerce, was approached for comment after delivering his keynote at the annual World Hyperbole Conference in Geneva, but would not speak to reporters. He was, however seen high-fiving Elon Musk off stage and doing what some described as a “clumsy Irish jig” upon learning the news.

Other industry veterans were more circumspect. Ryan Gozzi, a prominent Wall Street analyst who has been pushing many retail brands to shutter locations to improve profitability, commented “honestly I think this just goes too far. I always envisioned retailers would cut and cut until they had just a handful of stores that did like $15,000 per square foot, you know like Warby Parker, Bonobos and Birchbox.” When asked what he thought of today’s announcement Ron Johnson, who oversaw a failed attempt to re-invent JC Penney, looked earnestly into the interviewer’s eyes and exclaimed “Apple. Apple. Target. Apple. Target. Apple. Apple,” then added “golly that’s big news. I was only able to decrease Penney’s sales by about 40%. So signing up for destroying 100% of sales is truly transformative. Gosh I’m impressed.”

The complete shut down of all stores comes after many retailers had aggressively explored new strategies to revive their fortunes. According to multiple sources, newly appointed Macy’s CEO Jeff Gennette recently presented his Board with a bold plan to turn the storied retailer around. The strategy, developed with a team of 2nd year Wharton MBA students, was designed to transform the Macy’s culture and incorporate many of the components that have allowed so-called “digitally native” brands to grab market share away from traditional player while transferring billions of dollars from venture capitalists to consumers without anyone apparently noticing or caring.

The new plan reportedly called for the company to relocate its headquarters to a loft-building in the Pearl District of Portland where employees would receive complimentary Stumptown Coffee and Voodoo Donuts, in addition to an enhanced benefits package. Reports that corporate staff would be required to bring their dogs to work could not be independently confirmed. According to multiple sources, sales associates were to be re-named “customer service sensei’s” and the company would guarantee 15 minute delivery of any product anywhere in the continental United States for free. Initial plans also called for consumers to receive 1,500 Plenti points with every order over $50 but were dropped when research revealed that no one knew what Plenti points were.

According to insiders the plan hinged on four key elements:

• Liberal use of the words “disruptive” and “transformative” in conversation, written communication and speeches at analyst meetings and conferences.
• Getting on the cover of Fast Company.
• A willingness to lose a cumulative $27 billion over the next 10 years.
• A miracle happening in year 11.

The Board was reportedly initially intrigued, but the strategy lost support when one member pointed out that the plan was mostly just a description of Amazon’s strategy and that nothing was being done to improve the products Macy’s sold or the actual shopping experience. Ultimately a growing malaise crept over the Board despite plans to hold their Board dinner that evening at Masa. According to one long time Macy’s Director “while we were excited to dine together that night at arguably the best sushi restaurant outside of Japan, we couldn’t get past the realization that when it came to our business we had nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

While today’s announcement would seem to doom many once leading brands to the retail graveyard, some believe Walmart might come out ahead. The Bentonville, Arkansas based company recently began aggressively acquiring online-only brands in a bid to become “more customer relevant and digitally savvy.” Sean Spicer, Walmart’s newly appointed VP of Cash Incineration Initiatives, told the Wall Street Journal that the shuttering of all physical stores only validated what Walmart has been saying all along and that anyone who says otherwise is either stupid or lying. Challenged on that remark Spicer added: “Hold on, hold on, hold on. We’ve always maintained that the future of retail is selling cheap stuff that Americans need, shipping it to their house, losing money on every order and making it up on volume. If you can’t see that you haven’t been paying attention.” He then told reporters to direct any further questions to the Justice Department.

The economic impact of closings tens of thousands of stores and putting hundreds of thousands of people out of work remains unclear, but many were concerned it could lead to a recession. It also cast serious doubt on President Trump’s claim that ‘we would be winning so much we would get tired of winning.” Prior to today’s news a recent Gallup survey confirmed that most Americans weren’t remotely tired of winning.

Many commercial real estate investors also expressed concern that billions of square feet of vacant retail space coming on the market all at once would have a depressive effect on rents. Despite this widely shared belief, General Michael Flynn, recently named President of the Association for Commercial Real Estate Over-Capacity Denial” noted that the industry had gone through multiple down cycles over the years and that any excess supply would quickly be absorbed. “For every Home Depot or Target that closes there are plenty of Soul Cycles and expensive juice bars with that one employee awkwardly standing there to take their place” Flynn said.

Originally published at stevenpdennis.com on April 1, 2017.