The Kmart store in Kill Devil Hills will close in mid-April.
Transformco, which acquired both Kmart and Sears out of bankruptcy in 2019, confirmed the closing in an email to OBXToday on Wednesday afternoon.
Company spokesman Larry Costello said the decision was “difficult but necessary.”
A liquidation sale will begin later this week with the store closure planned for mid-April, Costello said.
Over 3,500 Kmart and Sears stores have been shutdown, costing about 250,000 jobs, over the last 15 years.
In November Transformco announced it would shutter 45 Kmart locations and 51 Sears stores across the country, but the Kill Devil Hills store was spared that round.
Kmart opened the 111,000-square-foot store at 1901 N. Croatan Highway in 1992. The 14-acre plot between the highways is now valued at more than $6 million.
There’s no word yet on what may replace the store, popular with both locals and visitors for nearly 30 years.
Sears Holdings, the previous parent company, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October 2018 and emerged last February 2019 through a last-minute deal arranged by the company’s longtime chairman, CEO and investor, Eddie Lampert, and his hedge fund ESL Investments, according to USA Today.
