Klosure: Kmart turning off the blue light

COEUR d'ALENE — When Gail Bowen heard the Coeur d'Alene Kmart will close in early October, she wasn't surprised.

But she was disappointed.

"They're all going to conglomerates or Walmart is taking over the world — maybe a little bit of both," the Coeur d'Alene woman said Friday after emptying her cart at the Coeur d'Alene Kmart.

"I like being able to get in and get out without going through 4,000 acres at Walmart."

Bowen said the closure is the latest development in a sad trend.

"We're losing the smaller discount stores," she said. "Many have already closed so I'm not surprised they're closing more. This narrows down what is left even more."

The closure of the Coeur d'Alene store is among 35 Kmarts and eight Sears stores that are unprofitable and will shut their doors this fall, Sears Holdings Corp. announced on Friday.

The retailer announced 265 other closings earlier this year. Sears in January announced its first round of closures. Three more rounds have been announced since then.

The latest closures will bring Sears' store count to fewer than 1,140, down from 2,073 five years ago.

"This is part of a strategy both to address losses from unprofitable stores and to reduce the square footage of other stores because many of them are simply too big for our current needs," Sears CEO Eddie Lampert said in a blog post.

Coeur d'Alene Kmart staff referred questions from The Press about specific details of the local closure to Sears' corporate public relations department. A message left at that office was not returned by deadline on Friday night.

Bowen said she's sad to see Kmart close in Coeur d'Alene because she has found Kmart's prices are comparable to other discount stores.

Coeur d'Alene's Fred Stanley said he wasn't shocked about the closure announcement based on the "near-empty" parking lot for the past few years.

"I saw it coming and am actually surprised that it lasted as long as it has," Stanley said after picking up a few items on Friday. "For whatever reason, it just hasn't had the volume of shoppers of the Walmarts."

Stanley said he has continued to shop at Kmart because it's near his home and isn't as busy as other stores. He said he can remember Kmart's "blue-light specials" more than 20 years ago when the store was here before Walmart moved in.

"I'm going to miss it because it's been handy for me," he said. "But it obviously hasn't been doing well based on seeing the empty aisles."