There is absolutely no doubt that the retail landscape at large is changing and we have the rise in digitization to thank for it.
The COVID-19 pandemic certainly caused a massive uptick in store closures across industries, however this is a problem that has been going on since around 2010.
Does a “retail apocalypse” sound scarier than it actually is?
Coined sometime around 2010 when brick and mortar stores began closing their doors, the term “retail apocalypse” gained a lot more traction when consumers had begun showing a greater interest in online shopping — a major contributing factor to changes in consumer spending patterns. At this point in time, it seems that store closures are necessary sacrifice for businesses to make if they wish to remain afloat in this increasingly competitive industry.
Amazon, the online retailer with offerings in just about any and every department you could think of, was quite the bulldozer to physical stores and pretty much ushered in the era of e-commerce. As a result, 2017 saw an astounding number of stores filing for bankruptcy. Fast forward three years to 2020, and this “retail apocalypse” was further bolstered by the pandemic and its subsequent forced store closures — some temporary, some not.
A count done by Retail Dive found that the following stores had filed for bankruptcy in 2017:
- Gymboree
- Rue21
- Payless
- Gander Mountain
- Gordmans stores
- RadioShack
- Styles For Less
- Toys R Us
- Aerosoles
- Vitamin World
- Perfumania
- Alfred Angelo
- True Religion
- Papaya Clothing
Coresight Research has also concluded that in 2020 close to 10,000 stores had closed down permanently as a result of unrecoverable losses. Despite the pandemic and lockdowns being a thing of the recent past, store closures are still continuing on to this day.
The first ten days of 2025 alone brought with it the closure of approximately 1,925 stores and Coresight Research has projected a total of around 15,000 closures for this year. Experts have further warned that the next five years will see the closure of a massive 45,000 stores across the industry.
Some stores predicted to close within the year are:
- Party City
- Big Lot
- Walgreens
- 7-Eleven
- Macy’s
Are store closures setting the tone for the future of retail?
When asked about the store closure epidemic, CEO of Retail Wire, Dominick Miserandino, recently shared in an exclusive interview with The U.S. Sun, “Fifteen thousand is a bleak and sad number. I think we have had the instability of Covid in the past. Now we have the instability of an administration and directional change.”
Miserandino, who is also a retail journalist and researcher, highlighted that uncertain times cannot equate to growth in economies. “It’s not a shock that with this instability, people are saying, ‘Let’s kind of slow down a little bit here, or tighten up a little bit and watch every dollar we have’,” he shared.
Miserandino did, however, clarify that despite the increasing number of retailer closures, a “retail apocalypse” is not is not the sole possible outcome for consumers.
Naturally, the surge in closures is a cause for concern to shoppers and employees alike. Employees now have an added stress of unstable job security and shoppers might not be able to find the products they need as easily.
Change is afoot
The term “retail apocalypse” is inaccurate and should rather be viewed as the furthering of technology in a retail space. The retail industry has had to make these necessary adjustments in order to keep up with rapid rates of digitization, consumer spending, and an uncertain economy. For example, the recent surge in AI implementation to processes does increase efficiency, however, Miserandino has warned against an over-reliance on automation.
“People are getting far removed from the customer experience, and the customer is really the key to it,” the CEO noted.
Leveraging automation and technology to increase efficiency whilst still enabling customers to have a fulfilling experience is a delicate dance and since this is a fairly novel concept, businesses are still going through a trial and error phase of implementation. Consumers can potentially view this increase in store closures as the beginning of retail 2.0 rather than the end of retail as a whole.