Joann to close all locations

Instead of closing about half of its locations, the fabric and craft store Joann will close all stores.

Joann sold its assets at auction last week to GA Group, a liquidation firm, Bloomberg reported.

As part of the sale, according to the court filing, the company would close all stores.

The company said on its restructuring website:

“Following a comprehensive sale process and auction, GA Group together with the Prepetition Term Loan Agent, was selected as having the winning bid to acquire substantially all of JOANN’s assets. Subject to court approval of the transaction, the winning bidders plan to wind-down ongoing operations and conduct going-out-of-business sales at all JOANN locations.

“We are committed to working constructively with the winning bidder to ensure an orderly wind-down of operations that minimizes the negative impact on all JOANN Team Members, vendors, customers and communities. Subject to court approval of the sale transaction, we expect to begin, or in some cases continue, going-out-of-business sales at all locations immediately.”

Joann had planned to close more than 500 of its 850 locations nationwide with going out of business sales starting last week USA Today reported.

The bid made by GA Group could pay off the pre-petition loan of $462.3 million that Joann documented when it filed for bankruptcy as well as the $105 million credit bid, according to Bloomberg.

The bid still has to be approved by the courts, and a hearing is scheduled for Wednesday.

The Akron Beacon Journal said that the stores should remain open until the end of May while offering employees time off to interview for other jobs and job fairs.

“We will help you close these stores with empathy, professionalism and efficiency,” GA Group Retail Solutions and Wholesale & Industrial Solutions teams Scott Carpenter said, according to the newspaper.