Women’s apparel store Christopher & Banks is considering strategies including a possible sale of the company or bankruptcy as customers remain hesitant to shop in its stores and sales continue to suffer during the coronavirus pandemic.
Sales decreased nearly 23% to $72.8 million in August, September and October compared to the same time last year, an improvement from earlier in the pandemic when state mandates forced Christopher & Banks to temporarily close its stores and sales plummeted more than 50%.
Still, company performance was not as good as executives had hoped, the retailer said on Thursday.
“While we saw sequential improvement in our sales trends in the third quarter, results did not meet our expectations,” said Keri Jones, the company’s chief executive, in a statement.
“We have not seen the level of sales recovery that we had anticipated,” she said. “We believe that COVID has had an outsized impact on our customer demographic as her shopping behavior is more pragmatic with limited demand for new outfits in the absence of social engagements.”
The Plymouth-based retailer lost $10.8 million during its third quarter ended Oct. 31.
The growth in online sales, which has helped slightly offset the company’s decline, also appears to have flattened with e-commerce sales increasing a little more than 32% compared with the same period last year but still a far cry from the nearly 71% jump in the second quarter.
The company is talking to external advisers, including investment banking firm B. Riley Securities Inc., to consider different options to improve the company’s liquidity.
Alternatives being evaluated include further lease concessions and deferrals for its stores, further reductions of operating and capital expenditures and refinancing the company’s debt, the company’s news release said. It also is considering a “sale of the company or its assets and restructuring its debt and liabilities through a private restructuring, or a restructuring under the protection of applicable bankruptcy laws.”
Nicole Norfleet • 612-673-4495
Twitter: @nicolenorfleet