Regional Family Dollar stores could face closure or re-bannering

Nineteen Family Dollar stores spread across the region could either be shuttered or re-bannered under plans announced by Dollar Tree Inc., the Chesapeake, Virginia-based parent company of the retailer.

Dollar Tree bought Family Dollar in 2015 for nearly $9 billion. Last year, Dollar Tree began closing underperforming Family Dollar stores ”“ 84 locations were shut down in the fourth quarter and 37 more stores were closed in 2018 than originally planned. In presenting the company”™s fourth-quarter and fiscal year 2018 earnings, Dollar Tree President and CEO Gary Philbin announced a further erasure of the Family Dollar brand from the national retail environment.

“Approximately 200 Family Dollar stores will be re-bannered to Dollar Tree, and we plan to close as many as 390 Family Dollar stores this year,” said Philbin, who added that the re-bannered Family Dollar stores “improved Dollar Tree”™s profitability by more than $55 million per year, which we expect to increase as more Family Dollar stores are re-bannered.”

Dollar Tree did not announce which of its Family Dollar stores would be re-bannered or closed. Regionally, there are 15 Family Dollar stores in the Westchester and Hudson Valley market (three in Yonkers, two each in Mount Vernon, Newburgh, Peekskill and Poughkeepsie, and one each in Beacon, Montgomery, Pleasant Valley and Spring Valley) and four in Fairfield County (two in Stratford and one each in Bridgeport and Danbury).