Checkout
Debt-Laden Merchants Face Reckoning Amid Retail Apocalypse
- Department stores fall out of favor with shoppers and lenders
- Countdown is on for Forever 21’s plan to keep doors open
This article is for subscribers only.
Retailers are strapping in for the final days of their traditional do-or-die holiday shopping period. For some, that could be meant literally, as creditors and vendors decide which ones are still worth supporting in a field plagued by fewer shoppers, more online competition and too much debt.
Some of the most familiar names -- Forever 21 Inc., Barneys New York Inc. and Payless Inc.-- have already collapsed into bankruptcy or liquidated this year. In 2019 alone, Coresight Research estimates, retailers have shut more than 9,300 stores. Among the survivors, fates have diverged, according to the restructuring experts at FTI Consulting Inc.