Clovis Dillard's location planning to close
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David Stevens
About two dozen shoppers were gathered outside Dillard's 10 minutes before it opened on Tuesday.
CLOVIS - After two decades of dressing eastern New Mexico, Dillard's department store is planning to close its North Plains Mall location.
Dillard's has been the southside anchor for the mall since 2000. It moved into its current location soon after Walmart left the mall spot in 1999.
Clovis' store manager Christopher Addison confirmed the store's closing, but said additional information would have to come from corporate offices.
About two dozen shoppers were gathered outside the store 10 minutes before it opened Tuesday morning. Signs on the windows stated new store hours but gave no indication when it might close for good.
Corporate spokeswoman Julie Johnson Guymon also confirmed the closing and said all of the store's 50 employees had been notified.
"While it is a difficult decision, we do strategically close locations from time to time," Guymon wrote in an email. "For instance, last year we closed 6 locations."
Guymon said she did not have a date for when the Clovis Dillard's will close.
A Dillard's press release issued Thursday showed the company reported a net loss of $162 million for the 13 weeks ended May 2. That compared to a net income of $78.6 million for the first quarter of 2019.
"COVID-19 has impacted every aspect of our business," Dillard's Chief Executive Officer William T. Dillard II stated in the release. "The mall business in general and department stores, specifically, have been particularly hard hit."
Dillard's temporarily closed all 285 of its stores across the country at some point during the pandemic. The Clovis location had been closed since mid-March, as ordered by New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, until reopening Tuesday.
