Pier 1 is going out of business, and they plan to close every one of their stores.
The following information is from Pier 1:
FORT WORTH, Texas–(BUSINESS WIRE)–May 19, 2020– Pier 1 Imports, Inc. (“Pier 1” or the “Company”) today announced that it has filed a motion seeking Bankruptcy Court approval to begin an orderly wind-down of the Company’s retail operations as soon as reasonably possible after store locations are able to reopen following the government-mandated closures during the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of the wind-down, the Company intends to sell its inventory and remaining assets, including its intellectual property and e-commerce business, through the court-supervised process.
Robert Riesbeck, Pier 1’s Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer said, “We are grateful to our dedicated and hardworking associates, millions of customers and committed vendors who have collectively supported Pier 1 for decades. We deeply value our associates, customers, business partners and the communities in which we operate, and this is not the outcome we expected or hoped to achieve. This decision follows months of working to identify a buyer who would continue to operate our business going forward. Unfortunately, the challenging retail environment has been significantly compounded by the profound impact of COVID-19, hindering our ability to secure such a buyer and requiring us to wind down.”
Together with its financial and legal advisors, Pier 1 engaged in a thorough analysis of all available alternatives prior to deciding on this course of action. Ultimately, due to the combination of a challenging retail environment and the new reality and uncertainty of a post-COVID world, the Company and its advisors determined that an orderly wind-down is the best way to maximize the value of Pier 1’s assets.
Pier 1 intends to initiate store closing efforts and liquidation sales once store locations can reopen, in compliance with COVID-19 guidelines from local government and health officials. The Company is currently continuing to serve customers through Pier1.com, and orders are being processed and filled.
photo credit: yelp.com
Pier 1 is underwater. No bailout.
Is this also counted as Covid related death? Horrible business model built on foreign slave wage workers. Shouldn’t even have existed to begin with.
Have to agree with that assessment Sam. I refused to shop there due to the global exploitation this company is/was guilty of. See Ya!
I believe some of Pier 1’s suppliers were accused of using child labor. So, a cotton farmer in Uzbekistan has his kids picking cotton. The school year starts and due to some sort of problem, he has to keep his kids working on the cotton farm for a couple of extra weeks, so they miss the start of school. That’s a violation of Pier 1’s policy, so Pier 1 terminates their contract with the farmer.
Who benefits from that situation? Children have worked on their parent’s farms since man had farms. They may miss some school but the family eats.
Which is more important: Your virtue signaling or some cotton farmer’s family in Uzbekistan eating?
Pier 1 Imports has been on a downhill slide for a few years now, but let’s blame the virus so the CEO and CFO can save face.
Well, at least they’re not blaming Trump.
I agree with you, Pier 1 has had problems for awhile. It is neither Trump nor Newsome’s fault. I use to shop there for different things, most often candles, but I found cheaper places to buy candles. A lot of those stores have not been able to keep up with the changing business environment. Anyone remember Linen’ and Things, I loved that store. How about Toy’s R Us, my understanding is the went under because they had too much debt. Businesses fail for many different reasons, bad management, bad financial decisions, products too expensive, it is often their own fault. Some businesses will unfortunately fail because of the SIP, and that is unfortunate, some on their way out anyway, and this just hurried up the process.
Thanks Governor, another victim of the Blue Flu. Remember this In November folks
They closed 30% of their stores after Christmas 2019. They were dying on the vine before the virus and according to financial experts would be gone by the end of 2020. So this has nothing to do with Newsom, Trump or anything political
Why do republican presidents always destroy the economy? Bush Sr. 1991, Bush Jr. 2008, Trump 2020. See a recession pattern?
@94521
So true!
I’m not very bright only went to school to eat my lunch .. but doesn’t congress control the purse strings?
@94521 – depends on your economic bracket. If you are rich, Trump has been great. Corporations and the wealthy made a ton of money on Trump’s tax plan. Trump’s tax cut actually caused my taxes to increase. I guess it’s about priorities and who you serve.
Pier 1, nieman marcus, jcpenny, the list keeps on going…. just let the economy crash and full reset…
Pier 1 and JC Penney was already in trouble. JC Penney’s clothing looked like it belong back 20-30 years ago or more, I think in that price class Kohls took over, before I worked at Macy’s and got an employee discount I would shop at Kohl’s and Macy’s. Don’t know about Neiman Marcus have not been in that store in years. There was one next to Macy’s at the Stanford Mall, but there was also a Bloomingdales, which is in the same price class as Neiman’s. As far as I can tell from my daughter’s generations and the customer’s I had at Stanford in their twenties and thirties, they don’t want to spend a lot of money on clothes, and of course if they buy a house in the Bay Area, they don’t have a lot of extra money. Anyway they are very cost conscious and like to shop on the internet.
JC Penney deserves to go. They gave up the idea of customer service many years ago. Use to be my go-to place. I’ve given up on that now!
Not surprised Pier One went under – they had nice things but it was so overpriced! I agree with Hanne that the merchandise in JC Penney looks like it’s been hanging there for 30 years. I don’t know how that place stays in business. My favorite store is Target. They have everything and make shopping so easy.
I didn’t even know they were in business to begin with.
I will miss them dearly. Every year I always bought Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas decor from them.
I didn’t know how far reaching power our governor has, all the way to Texas???? Why not blame POTUS. Oh, that’s right, he is a Republican.
Newsom is to blame, blue flu hits again
I loved shopping there. The last place I shopped before the lockdown
New gun stores in the vacant Pier 1 stores. We don’t need more clothing stores, weed dispensaries or Starbucks. Make AMERICA great again!!!!
Only the beginning…
Pier 1 has been flirting with bankruptcy for a while though. Business is this sector is being gobbled up by Wayfair, Amazon, Homegoods and Target.
The way I see it-having grown up in Concord in the 70’s and 80’s-Cost Plus (especially before it became World Market) was a far better store…and even today is better than Pier 1. Not surprised at this story, nor do I find myself terribly disappointed. I feel for the employees, though….
Alot of American stores that go out of business, you will find in Mexico.
No one has shopped at pier one in concord for over 20 years let’s face it this has been coming for years and years.
Does anyone think it’s weird this guy was the CEO and CFO? Either this was already a cost saving measure or he was doing both jobs poorly. I’ve never heard of that before in a large Corp
My friends and I used to love going to Pier One way back in the 70’s. We’d buy Botan Rice Candy when it had good prizes you could choke on instead of stickers. Nowadays it’s just a lot of overpriced homegoods.
Cost Plus was a fun place to go. They had all kinds of cool kind of knickknack stuff. Candy, foods and other things. Pier 1 not so much.
I’ll really miss Pier One for …….? Oh, maybe that explains it.