US organic grocery chain Earth Fare set to close amid squeeze on small supermarkets

04 Feb 2020 --- US specialty natural and organic grocery store Earth Fare has begun inventory liquidation sales at all of its stores. The company, a competitor to Whole Foods Market, is pursuing a sale of assets, in whole or in parts. Despite several strategic initiatives to save the business, the company admits that continued challenges in the retail industry has impeded its progress as well as its ability to refinance its debt.

“Earth Fare has been proud to serve the natural and organic grocery market, and the decision to begin the process of closing our stores was not entered into lightly. We’d like to thank our team members for their commitment and dedication to serving our customers, and our vendors and suppliers for their partnership,” says an Earth Fare statement.

Earth Fare is the latest smaller supermarket impacted by the squeeze in the retail space. Over the course of the past few years, the company has tried to implement plans aimed at growth, expansion and enhancing the customer experience.

“While many of these initiatives improved the business, continued challenges in the retail industry impeded the company’s progress as well as its ability to refinance its debt. As a result, Earth Fare is not in a financial position to continue to operate on a go-forward basis. As such, we have made the difficult, but necessary decision to commence inventory liquidation sales while we continue to engage in a process to find potential suitors for our stores,” adds the statement.

The inventory liquidation sales will feature an assortment of merchandise at very significant price reductions, notes the company.

All employees have been notified of the impending closure of the company’s stores and corporate office, in line with the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN).

Based in Asheville, North Carolina, Earth Fare has long served the natural and organic grocery market. It is, however, the latest smaller supermarket impacted by the squeeze in the retail space. Recently, the withdrawal of financial support for US supermarket Lucky’s Market from Kroger at the end of 2019 led to a company downsizing to just seven surviving stores and a Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection filing this year. Meanwhile, New York grocer Fairway Market, known for its gourmet food, filed for bankruptcy with a plan to sell five stores last month. 

Edited by Gaynor Selby