Popular games retailer GameStop is to close two hundred stores around the world, with more culls to come as it fights to stay afloat.
The world’s largest video game retailer, GameStop, has a staggering number of stores around the world: Over 5,700 as of September 2019.
While that massive number of retail locations might’ve made sense in a previous decade, it’s become a liability for the game retail giant as consumers increasingly buy digital games.
That’s why, among many other reasons, GameStop is beginning to shut down some of its many retail locations. “We are on track to close between 180 and 200 underperforming stores globally by the end of this fiscal year,” GameStop CFO Jim Bell said on the company’s Q2 earnings call Tuesday.
And that’s not all: The company is expecting to close a “much larger” group of stores in the next one to two years.
The initial wave of closures, Bell said, are “opportunistic,” whereas the next wave of closures will come from a deeper look at each store and its region.
“We are applying a more definitive, analytic approach, including profit levels and sales transferability, that we expect will yield a much larger tranche of closures over the coming 12 to 24 months,” Bell said on Tuesday’s investor call.
GameStop has been the source of a large number of Star Wars exclusives over the years, ranging from toys to Pops to comics, and many fans will be concerned to see their local store close.
