Kmart in Farmingville to close this fall
The Kmart store at 2280 N. Ocean Ave. in Farmingville is closing. Credit: Google Maps
Another Kmart will call it quits on Long Island.
The discount retailer’s store in Farmingville will close this fall for “economic" reasons, affecting 91 employees, according to a state regulatory notice filed Thursday and posted online Monday.
The employee separations will occur Nov. 13 or during a 14-day period starting on that date, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) filing submitted to the New York State Department of Labor.
Transform Holdco LLC, the Hoffman Estates, Illinois, company that bought Kmart and its sister chain, Sears, this year after a bankruptcy filing, did not provide details on why the store at 2280 N. Ocean Ave. in Farmingville is closing.
“After careful review, we have made the difficult but necessary decision to close the Kmart in Farmingville," Transform said in a statement Monday. "A liquidation sale is expected to begin later this month and the store is planned to close between late October and late November. As we promised, all eligible associates will be offered the same number of weeks of severance as offered to employees of Sears Holdings Corporation prior to that company’s Chapter 11 filing in October 2018.”
Under the WARN Act, certain employers must notify workers and the state in advance of mass layoffs or work site closings.
The Kmart in Farmingville is in a 103,000-square-foot space in Expressway Plaza, said Kenneth R. Schuckman, president of Schuckman Realty Inc., the Lake Success-based firm marketing the property.
A prospective tenant is in the process of leasing about half that space, said Schuckman, who declined to name the business.
“This is not going to be one of those boxes that sits. We’ve had interest in this box for a long time,” said Schuckman, who said the shopping center’s proximity to Exit 63 on the Long Island Expressway and traffic of some 50,000 cars a day make it a desirable location.
Expressway Plaza’s other tenants include Stop & Shop, LA Fitness, Starbucks and a TGI Friday’s restaurant.
Sears Holdings Corp. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in October, and its assets were purchased by Transform, an affiliate of former Sears CEO Eddie Lampert’s ESL Investments Inc., for $5.2 billion in February.
Mired in debt and losing shoppers to discount competitors such as Walmart and Target and to online retailers, Sears Holdings had been closing hundreds of Sears and Kmart stores for years.
Past Long Island closings include a Sears in Hicksville in April 2018, a Kmart in West Babylon in September, a Kmart in Riverhead and a Sears in New Hyde Park in November, a Sears in Garden City in January and a Kmart in Huntington in February.
On Aug. 6, Transform said it would close 26 Sears and Kmart stores in October and November, but none of the stores on the list were on Long Island.
After the Farmingville closing, Long Island will have two Kmarts, in Bridgehampton and Bohemia. There are also three Sears stores — in Smith Haven Mall in Lake Grove, Sunrise Mall in Massapequa and Green Acres Mall in Valley Stream — and two Sears Auto Centers, in Valley Stream and Massapequa.
Tory N. Parrish covers retail and small business for Newsday. She has worked at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y.
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