Sears to close Sandusky Mall store

PERKINS TWP.The Sears department store at Sandusky Mall will close soon, a victim of the historic retail chain's current struggles.The Cafaro Company, the Youngstown-based mall owner, has received confirmation that the Sears will shut down in the early summer. No date has been provided yet, but the store is expected to be closed by late June, said Joe Bell, a spokesman for the Cafaro Company.Bell said Cafaro plans to move quickly to find a replacement for Sears. Leasing officials who have followed Sears' troubles have been talking to other retailers for awhile now."There's been some very active interest," Bell said. "Those discussions aren't finalized yet, but we're hoping that in the coming months, we'll be able to announce plans for the Sears space."Sears corporate spokesman Howard Riefs said Wednesday that the Sandusky Sears and the Sears Auto Center both will close in late June. The two businesses have 44 employees, he said."Those associates that are eligible will receive severance and have the opportunity to apply for open positions at area Sears or Kmart stores," he said.He said Sears is closing stores to reduce expenses."Store closures are part of a series of actions we're taking to reduce on-going expenses, adjust our asset base, and accelerate the transformation of our business model," Riefs said.The store's liquidation sale for bargain hunters will begin April 22, he said.The on-duty manager at the Sandusky Mall Sears store would not answer questions Wednesday but asked the Register to call the corporate office.Cafaro Company officials are used to having to replace departing stores.When the Borders bookstore at the mall closed, mall officials quickly replaced it with a Books A Million store."In a lot of ways, this is part of just the regular cycle of retail," Bell said.Referring to the Cafaro officials who lease store space, Bell said, "They're accustomed to always keeping an eye down the road."Sears officials have had to battle red ink and declining sales in both its Sears stores and in Kmart stores, which Sears also owns.Sears Holdings reported on Feb. 25 that during the company's fourth quarter, shareholders lost $580 million, while same store sales in U.S. Sears stores fell 6.9 percent from the fourth quarter of the previous year.The fourth quarter sales decline actually was an improvement over the rest of 2015, which wasn't a good year for Sears. Revenues from merchandise sales and services fell from $31.2 billion in 2014 to $25.1 billion in 2015, a decline of $6.1 billion.News reports from other publications indicated that other Sears stores in the U.S. also are being shut down.The Sears location at the Sandusky Mall is closing later this year.