Posted on 05/30/2023 8:59:00 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
The trend has been called a retail exodus. In the past few months there have been more than a dozen store closures in downtown San Francisco. I’ve written about the closure of a flagship Whole Foods which made 568 calls to 911 over the 13 months it was open. A 300,000 square foot Nordstroms is closing as is Office Depot, Anthropologie, Saks Off 5th and many more. The SF Chronicle put together this map showing the recent closures.
And last week another major retailer announced it was closing up. Old Navy will be shutting down its San Francisco store this summer.
The Old Navy flagship store in Downtown San Francisco will close its Market Street location on July 1, a company spokesperson said Friday.
Old Navy has held a lease at the 801 Market St. location since 1997 and held a grand opening for the store in 1999. A spokesperson for Old Navy’s parent company, San Francisco-based Gap Inc., said the way the company “leverages” its flagship locations has changed.
To be clear, it seems that Gap Inc., which owns Old Navy, is not doing well so this closure is partly motivated by larger problems.
The company has been in the midst of a nationwide downsizing that has included announcing it would lay off around 1,800 corporate employees in April. The company is searching for a chief executive after its former CEO, Sonia Syngal, stepped down last July.
In 2020, the company shuttered its flagship Gap store at Powell and Market streets, close to the Old Navy location, as well as Gap stores in Embarcadero Center and Stonestown Galleria.
But there’s definitely more to why this particular store is closing. For one thing it’s not far from the giant Nordstroms flagship store that just announced closure. For another, the store was a victim of constant shoplifting, not just a few times a week but a dozen times a day.
“They’re (shoplifters) there every day. When I’m on the floor walking around I would say at least 12, 14 during the day,” the worker said. “It’s really bad because it’s downtown San Francisco and it’s really out of control.”…
The worker said the flagship store, which is set to close July 1st, was hit 22 times by thieves in the last two days. And in the last year, the problem has worsened.
“I recognize a lot of them and they’re just super comfortable, sometimes they’ll take two or three mesh bags at a time, and that sometimes is $2,000 worth of stuff,” they said…
the Old Navy worker said shoplifters regularly curse, throw things at them, or worse.
Old Navy has released a typical, bland statement about “evaluating its real estate portfolio” and saying nothing at all about crime. That works out great for city leaders like Mayor London Breed who said last week that the recent string of departures was not about “the issues and the conditions.” But clearly if $5,000 of merchandise is walking out of the store every day, there’s no way for that store to succeed.
Here’s the KPIX report about the conditions at Old Navy. It’s not so different from the NY Times report about the conditions at Whole Foods.
*toilet-flushing sound*
you said...”*toilet-flushing sound*”
not yet ... they are just jiggling the handle ..
and this will be one of those double flush jobs...
you know ... like when you tell your wife “ don’t go in there”
Every single thief in Commiefornia should be fortunate they don’t live in the Middle East where they will just chop off hands and feet as punishment!
SF=paradise for thieves
Will the last person to leave California please turn out the lights.....
Turn out the lights? We’ll be lucky to have matches for candles the way things are going!
Is the picture at the top of this post a shoplifter headed for the front door?
With all the businesses leaving, who’s going to pay the taxes?
[the closure of a flagship Whole Foods which made 568 calls to 911 over the 13 months it was open.]
43.69 calls per month on average. Lasted for only 13 months?
WOW
Is that 4 Amazon Go stores closing I see on that map?
But the automated palm-print scanners... (cell phone sometimes)
Only thing I ever will admit to agreeing with Muslims on.
Which countries are you referring to Specifically? I was just there and don’t recall seeing and handless or footless people. I do however recall seeing well mannered people including children.
Kamala and San Fran nan have quite a legacy there. It is bearing the fruit they planted, but left… well maybe Nancy p still lives among the people.
The Communist government of the United States.
26 store closures plus one, Gap. That can’t be a good sign even for the purblind San Francisco Chronicle.
The remaining open stores will be closing more frequently now. The less dogs, the more fleas on the ones left...until all the dogs are gone and only the fleas are left. Interesting that it’s leftside politics that allow the fleas to flourish in the first place.
Virtually no retailer will want to stay there
The thieves will have no place to steal from
Much like WalMart leaving other places
They’ll blame the stores, of course
Is anyone here on FR following the store closures in Shitcago? It’s not “San Fran” bad, but it’s still pretty bad!
John Galt called. He wants his plot line back.
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