Mall-based apparel retailers have been among the hardest hit financially by the COVID-19 crisis. The pandemic brought a double blow to the sector. Safety concerns have kept shoppers away from indoor malls at the same time as consumers, many of them working from home and avoiding social gatherings, have pulled back spending on clothes.
Christopher & Banks’ disclosure that it might not survive the crisis followed a third quarter that brought a sales decline of 22.6% year over year and saw a total loss of $10.8 million.
That represented an improvement over the company’s second quarter, which brought a deeper sales decline and net loss. But Q3 fell short of the company’s own expectations, according to CEO Keri Jones, who joined the company in 2018 after previously serving as an executive at Dick’s Sporting Goods.
Source: Retail Dive