Family Dollar, With 150+ Va Stores, Closing Hundreds Of Sites

Family Dollar, which has more than 150 stores in Virginia, says it will close as many as 390 stores nationwide and add adult beverages and other changes to some remaining locations.

Kayleigh Painter, a spokeswoman for the company, confirmed the closures in an email to Patch, but said the company isn’t releasing the full list of stores that “will, or may, close.”

There are Family Dollar stores in Dale City, Fredericksburg, Woodbridge, and Manassas, along with Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Richmond and Charlottesville. There are three locations in Washington, D.C., as well.

Family Dollar sells bargain goods including household cleaners, foods, health and beauty products, toys and clothes. Most items in the stores can be bought for less than $10. But the retailer has struggled in recent years and was bought by Dollar Tree in 2015. The chain of bargain brands has faced pressure to sell or revamp operations, CNN reported.

About 200 stores will be rebranded, media outlets reported. Dollar Tree operates 15,237 stores across 48 states and five Canadian provinces, the company said in a release. Stores operate under the brands of Dollar Tree, Family Dollar and Dollar TreeCanada.

The news comes as Gary Philbin, Dollar Tree’s CEO and president, said Wednesday that Family Dollar had delivered its “strongest quarterly same-store sales growth of the year,” in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2018. Dollar Tree moved “aggressively” to “optimize” Family Dollar’s performance,” Philbin said. That included closing 84 stores and announcing plans to renovate at least 1,000 others in 2019.

“We are confident we are taking the appropriate steps to reposition our Family Dollar brand for increasing profitability as business initiatives gain traction in the back half of fiscal 2019,” Philbin said. “Improving the consistency of execution and optimizing our real estate portfolio will contribute to a meaningful improvement in our shoppers’ in-store experience and store traffic.”

The company said it is rolling out a new model for new and renovated Family Dollar stores, which will bring “significantly improved merchandise offerings,” the company said, including $1 merchandise. Furthermore, the company plans to offer adult beverages at about 1,000 stores and expand freezers and coolers in roughly 400 stores.

The new model has seen increased traffic, and has performed particularly well at the most challenged Family Dollar stores, the company said.

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Patch national staffer Dan Hampton contributed to this report