Among Large, Trouble Retailers, 1 Million Jobs at Stake

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Jan 12, 12:57PM EST · Published Apr 16, 6:21AM EDT

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Among America’s eight most troubled large retailers, nearly 1 million jobs are at stake as the industry continues to collapse in on itself, damaged by sales that have continued to dive, largely due to e-commerce. Not all of these jobs will be lost. However, as more and more companies in the industry go bankrupt and others slash tens of thousands of jobs, many of these positions are at extreme risk.

According to the Retail 100, the 20 largest retailers, excluding fast food, include eight walking wounded, which are chains that already have shown loses, closed stores and laid off employees, or are already, in the case of Sears Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ: SHLD), potential Chapter 11 candidates. These are Target Corp. (NYSE: TGT) with 300,000 employees, Macy’s Inc. (NYSE: M) with 125,000, Sears with 120,000, J.C. Penney Co. Inc. (NYSE: JCP) with 80,000, Kohl’s Corp. (NYSE: KSS) with 25,000, Gap Inc. (NYSE: GPS) with 115,000, Best Buy Co. Inc. (NYSE: BBY) with 125,000, and Nordstrom Inc. (NYSE: JWN) with 80,000. Together, they have 970,000 employees.

These do not include jobs at retailers that are doing moderately well, for now. This includes Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) and Costco Wholesale Corp. (NASDAQ: COST), both of which face the headwinds their weaker rivals do.

Granted, a large number of people at these companies do not work at stores or in warehouse or logistical operations which serve these stores directly. Headquarters and administrative staff, do, however, rely almost completely on their store performance for ongoing employment.

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The extent to which any of these jobs are at risk depends on how deep the problems become, and some experts believe it will become extremely deep.

According to CNBC:

The retail industry’s pain is being felt by its massive workforce.

Barely a quarter into 2017, year-to-date store closings have already topped the historical high of 2008, a Credit Suisse report said Thursday. About 2,880 stores have closed year to date, compared with 1,153 at the same time last year.

Since 60 percent of store closures are typically announced in the first five months of the year, Credit Suisse estimates there could be more than 8,640 store closings this year.

The impact of these closures — a mixture of shrinking store fleets and Chapter 11 filings — is already trickling into the industry’s nearly 16 million jobs. Almost 30,000 retail workers lost their jobs in March, and more than 60,000 jobs have been eliminated since January.

Over 60,000 jobs lost in one quarter. And the trend appears to be accelerating.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.