The Bangor Mall location of Claire’s, the national jewelry and piercing chain, will avoid closure as other Maine stores prepare to shut down amid bankruptcy proceedings, court documents show.
Claire’s filed for bankruptcy Aug. 6 and was later approved by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware to hold store closing sales at nearly all of its American stores, including the Bangor Mall location. The following week, a banner went up on the company’s website advertising closing sales at all locations.
But the company filed a revised list of closing and non-closing stores Monday that indicates the Bangor location will stay open. Two other Maine stores — in South Portland’s Maine Mall and at Freeport Village Station — are now slated to close, according to the filing.
Claire’s has 1,326 U.S. locations, according to USA Today, and 291 are expected to close under the latest filing.
The store closing sales were discontinued at some locations on Aug. 16, according to this week’s court filing. The Claire’s website now says it’s holding store closing sales only at select locations.
A representative from the Bangor Mall told local radio station I-95 FM earlier this month that Bangor Claire’s managers had initially been informed the store would close and planned to sell off the store’s inventory.
The new, shorter list of stores set to close was filed a few days after Claire’s announced it had sold part of its North American business to an affiliate of the private equity firm Ames Watson for $104 million. That sale allowed the company to “[pause] the liquidation process at a significant number of stores,” according to a press release.
