Younkers parent company to shut 40 stores

CEDAR RAPIDS - The parent company of department store Younkers plans to close 40 stores.

York. Penn.-based Bon-Ton Stores announced Thursday it will shutter the stores through 2018. It did not say which stores will close.

'This will enable us with moving forward with a more productive store footprint and redirecting capital expenditures toward investments designed to drive sales growth,” Bon-Ton Stores President and CEO William Tracy said in a news release.

The company has about 260 stores under the Younkers, Bon-Ton, Bergner's and other names.

Younkers operates two stores in Cedar Rapids - at Westdale Mall and at Lindale Mall - and one at Coral Ridge Mall. It also has locations in Des Moines, West Des Moines, Cedar Falls, Waterloo and Muscatine, among others.

Bon-Ton Stores made the closure announcement when reporting its earnings Thursday, which included a 6.6 percent drop in comparable store sales and a net loss of $44.9 million.

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