Thousands of employees affected
Karstadt Kaufhof: These Galeria department stores are closing
03/13/2023 3:48 p.m
Clear cut in German inner cities: The department store group Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof seals the end for 52 of the remaining 129 department stores. Which locations are affected? The complete cross-off list at a glance.
The retail group Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof wants to part with a significant part of its department stores. Of the currently 129 department stores with around 17,400 employees, a total of 52 branches are to be closed.
Which department stores are on the list? A look at the 52 locations threatened with closure:
Until end of June 2023 According to the general works council, branches in the following cities are to be closed: Celle, Coburg, Cottbus, Duisburg (two branches), Erlangen, Gelsenkirchen, Hagen, Hamburg-Harburg, Hamburg-Wandsbek, Leipzig Neumarkt, Leverkusen, Munich train station, Neuss, Nuremberg, Nuremberg-Langwasser, Offenbach, Paderborn, Regensburg Neupfarrplatz, Saarbrücken (two branches), Siegen and Wiesbaden (two branches).
Until January 2024 According to the information, the following locations are planned to be closed: Bayreuth, Berlin-Charlottenburg, Berlin-Müllerstraße, Bielefeld, Braunschweig, Bremen, Darmstadt (two branches), Dortmund, Düsseldorf-Schadowstraße, Essen, Esslingen, Frankfurt Zeil, Hanau, Heidelberg Bismarckplatz, Hildesheim, Kempten, Krefeld, Leonberg, Limburg, Lübeck, Mönchengladbach, Oldenburg, Pforzheim, Reutlingen, Rosenheim, Rostock and Schweinfurt.
More than 5,000 people are threatened with dismissal, they say. The Galeria supervisory board met in the afternoon for a crisis meeting.
The department store chain has been reeling from one crisis to the next for years. Most recently, the official requirements in the Corona crisis had put a strain on business, and the group resorted to state aid. Then the branches suffered from consumer reluctance after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In addition, home-made problems caused the group to create problems.
The department store chain belongs to the billionaire Signa Holding of the Austrian investor Rene Benko, who had merged Karstadt and Kaufhof. Two years ago, Galeria Karstadt Kaufhof had already closed a good 40 of the 172 branches at the time during the insolvency proceedings, with around 5,000 employees losing their jobs.