Lord & Taylor is closing its Livingston and Rockaway stores permanently as the company prepares to shake off dozens of locations after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy earlier this month.
The Livingston store is located at 112 Eisenhower Pkwy., While the Rockaway spot at 301 Mt. Hope Ave.
Official closing dates have not yet been announced. Both stores are currently holding liquidation sales, according to Lord & Taylor’s website. Returns will no longer be accepted in these stores, and online returns will not be accepted as of August 31st.
The closures will leave just six Lord & Taylor stores in New Jersey, according to the company’s website: One each in Bridgewater, Freehold Township, Lawrenceville and Westfield, and two in Paramus (Garden State Plaza and Fashion Center).
It is unknown how many more stores, if any, will be affected in the immediate future.
On Thursday afternoon, employees at the stores in Bridgewater and Westfield said these locations would remain open while calls to the spots of Lawrenceville, Garden State Plaza and Fashion Center went unanswered. An employee of Lord & Taylor in Freehold Township would not comment when asked if the store remained open, instead referring a reporter to the public relations department.
Neither Lord & Taylor nor Le Tote, which owns the department store, responded to requests for comment.
The news comes less than a month after Forbes reported that the Lord & Taylor would close at Willowbrook Mall in Wayne. Liquidation sales have already begun there as well, as well.
Shops that were previously in Woodbridge and Moorestown also closed in the last year.
Lord & Taylor, founded in 1826, has about $ 137.9 million in debt, the main reason for its bankruptcy. Hudson’s Bay Company sold the department store for $ 75 million in 2019 to Le Tote, which has also since filed for bankruptcy.
It has been a rough year for the brick-and-mortar retailer, which has already struggled.
JCPenney, Neiman Marcus and Sears are department stores that have also filed for bankruptcy during the coronavirus pandemic, along with Brooks Brothers, New York & Company, Sur La Table, Pier 1 Imports and Lucky Brand.
However, as the brick-and-mortar retail sector suffers, there have been enormous spikes in online shopping in recent months, and companies have pulled all the stops to take advantage of the flow.
Among those currently offering some great sales: Amazon, Le Creuset, Lululemon, Nordstrom and Wayfair.
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