Walmart last year closed 23 stores across the US, eight of which were in Illinois, it emerged this week

Overall, its total number of stores fell by 102, from 4,717 in January 2023 to 4,615 a year later.

That’s because in addition to the 23 closures, Walmart sold a combined 79 Moosejaw and Bonobos locations after selling the two retailers.

The closures were revealed in company filings this week after it also announced that its revenue in the most recent quarter was up 6 percent to $173 billion.

They come despite an announcement in January that the company would expand by more than 150 stores over the next five years.

Spokespeople for Walmart said the stores it closed were not generating sufficient sales or performing as well as expected.

‘We have nearly 5,000 stores across the US and unfortunately some do not meet our financial expectations,’ they said.

The closures happened in 14 different states – Illinois, Indiana, Hawaii, Washington, Minnesota, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Florida, Texas, DC, Kansas, Oregon, California, Georgia and Connecticut.

Among those affected were 12 ‘Supercenters’, seven ‘Neighborhood Markets’ and four ‘Discount Stores’. One of those Supercenters is scheduled to reopen as a Neighborhood Market in Atlanta.

It also shut two ‘pickup only’ experimental stores in Illinois and Arkansas.

Four of the total closures were in Chicago and first announced in April last year.

‘The simplest explanation is that collectively our Chicago stores have not been profitable since we opened the first one nearly 17 years ago,’ it said in a statement at the time. 

‘These stores lose tens of millions of dollars a year, and their annual losses nearly doubled in just the last five years,’ they said.

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