Best Buy to close 50 stores

On March 29, Minneapolis-based electronics retailer Best Buy released its financial results for 2012 and revealed a net loss of $1.7 billion. The shortfall will reverberate throughout the retailer’s holdings, prompting changes at the corporate level and the closing of 50 Best Buy stores across the country. Best Buy has a store in Baldwin — as well as in nearby Valley Stream and Westbury — but the fates of those stores have yet to be determined.

“As part of our multi-channel strategy,” Brian J. Dunn, Best Buy’s CEO, said in a statement in the company’s online news center, “we intend to strengthen our portfolio of store formats and footprints — closing some big box stores, modifying others to our enhanced Connected Store format, and adding Best Buy Mobile stand-alone locations.”

The company did notify employees at five stores in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area and one near San Antonio that they would be closed. The retailer has promised to announce details about additional closings as they are finalized.

The uncertainty has left employees at the Baldwin store on Sunrise Highway — which opened in 2007 and employs nearly 90 people — wondering if their jobs may be on the chopping block.

An employee of the store, who asked not to be named, had this reaction to the news: “If the Best Buy in Baldwin were to close, I think I would be devastated, honestly. I would then be out of a job that I've had for more than a year now and which has been my only job ever. I just hope that they don't close because it's important to have a store like Best Buy in our Baldwin community. It brings in plenty of people from nearby towns and gives them a reason to come to Baldwin. It would be a loss to Baldwin if our Best Buy were to close.”

The company has announced plans to support affected employees to the extent that it can, through either transfers to remaining stores or severance packages.