READ THIS NEXT: These Beloved Century-Old Stores Are Closing for Good, Starting Today. The retail space is already preparing to lose some stores next month. At the end of July, Business Journals reported that PNC Financial Services Group would be closing 135 locations within grocery stores across the U.S. The in-store locations will close in waves throughout next year, but the reductions will start Oct. 21, according to the news outlet. Also next month, it’s the end of an era, as the last remaining Sears location in New York will shutter for good on Oct. 16, Mid-Hudson News reported. Now, more retail closures have been confirmed for October. A major drugstore chain is gearing up to close locations next month, based on various news reports. Annandale Today reported on Sept. 13 that CVS is closing a store in Falls Church, Virginia, and the same day, News Channel 11 in Johnson City, Tennessee, revealed that the pharmacy company would also be closing a store in that area. Both locations will close on Oct. 5, according to the news outlets. A manager at the CVS on Arlington Boulevard in Falls Church told Annandale Today that the store’s lease is not being renewed and that employees are being offered jobs at the company’s other stores. News Channel 11 reported that a direct reason has not been offered for the closure of a CVS on North Roan Street in Johnson City, but the company told the news outlet all current employees of the soon-to-be-shuttered store have also already received offers for “comparable roles within the company.” There is another CVS on North Roan Street located three miles away that will remain in business, as well as one other CVS location in Johnson City, per the news outlet. RELATED: For more up-to-date information, sign up for our daily newsletter. This news comes the same day CVS shuttered a location in Fresno, California, according to Your Central Valley. The company permanently closed a store on Fulton Street in the city’s downtown area on Sept. 13. The now-shuttered CVS had been open in Fresno for decades, so its closure was not taken lightly. “I know I’m concerned, I really will miss it,” resident Tommy Cerbo Jr., who visited the store daily after living down the street from it for 33 years, told the news outlet. A CVS spokesperson told News Channel 11 that “maintaining access to pharmacy services in communities” is one of the most important factors the company considers when it makes the decision to close specific stores. “Other factors include local market dynamics, population shifts, a community’s store density, and ensuring there are other geographic access points to meet the needs of the community, including COVID-19 testing and vaccinations,” the spokesperson said in a statement. If you’ve been keeping up with news about CVS recently, you know these three store are not outliers. The company has already closed stores all across the U.S. this year in states like Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Maryland, California, Florida, Texas, and Georgia—among others. This falls in line with plans CVS revealed last year. In Nov. 2021, the pharmacy chain announced that it would be closing around 900 of its stores over the next three years as part of an initiative to implement a “new retail footprint strategy aligned to evolving consumer needs.” CVS confirmed at the time that the closures were set to start in spring 2022 with about 300 locations closing each year—and it has been shuttering stores since at least April of this year, as promised.ae0fcc31ae342fd3a1346ebb1f342fcb “The company has been evaluating changes in population, consumer buying patterns and future health needs to ensure it has the right kinds of stores in the right locations for consumers and for the business,” CVS explained in its Nov. 2021 statement.
