Wal-Mart to close 10 Sam’s Club stores

Industry News - AM
By Rita Jane Gabbett on 1/13/2010

Sam's Club President and CEO Brian Cornell announced in a memo to employees the company will close 10 financially underperforming Sam's Club locations in the United States as part of a strategy to leverage expenses and drive member value.

Sam's Club is a unit of Wal-Mart Stores Inc.

The impacted Clubs are located in Nampa, Idaho; La Quinta, Calif.; Louisville, Colo.; Vista, Calif.; Rolling Meadows, Ill.; Clay, N.Y.; Irvine, Calif.; Sacramento, Calif., Houston and Phoenix. Approximately 1,500 Sam's Club employees will be impacted by the closures.

The Club closures are one piece of a larger strategy focused on driving superior value, growth and improved returns," said Cornell. "We remain committed to opening and operating the best Clubs in the warehouse industry, in the right sizes and formats, in locations that make the best use of our capital."

Cornell said by the end of this fiscal year, Sam's Club will have added 6 stores and completed 52 remodels. In fiscal 2011, the unit plans to add between five and 10 new, expanded or relocated Clubs and remodel between 60 and 80 Clubs.

Wal-Mart Stores said it will disclose the financial details for closing these 10 Sam's Clubs when it announces its fourth-quarter earnings for fiscal 2010 on Feb. 18. The closures are not expected to have a material adverse impact on the company's consolidated fourth-quarter earnings, the company said in a statement on its Web site.