Walmart Superstore leaves Chatham

Walmart Superstore leaves Chatham

By Tia Carol Jones

On Tuesday, April 11th, Walmart announced that it would close four locations in Chicago on Sunday, April 16th. One of those locations is the Chatham Walmart, located at 8431 S. Stewart. The Walmart Academy is also set to close, along with the Walmart Health Center, which opened in 2020. The pharmacy will remain open for 30 days so that people with prescriptions will have time to move them to another pharmacy.

According to the outgoing 21^st Ward Alderman Howard Brookins, upon being informed about the closing of the store, he met with 21^st Ward Alderman-elect Ronnie Mosley and 6^th Ward Alderman-elect William Hall. “It was profoundly disappointing. I thought that we were out of the woods with respect to the fragility of the store. For years, I had always been told the store was losing money, but when they decided to re-invest in the store after it was destroyed after the George Floyd protest, I thought we had turned a corner. Then, they built the Walmart Academy and that further gave me hope they would continue to invest in the community,” Brookins said.

Once Brookins received word about the Walmart closing, he said he started to call developers to see what was possible. For the Walmart Academy, Brookins and Walmart are looking for non-profits to inhabit the space.  According to Brookins, there are more than 400 jobs that will be lost at the Chatham location. Brookins also has spoken with Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson and has reached out to outgoing Mayor Lori Lightfoot.

Brookins acknowledged there is a Jewel Food Store on 87^th near the Dan Ryan, 95^th and Ashland, also a Jewel Food Store in Marshfield Plaza on a 119th, A Food 4 Less at 112 W. 87^th St. and an Aldi’s at 8500 S. Holland Road. “The 21^st Ward won’t be a food desert, but Walmart will be sorely missed. They provided a need that other retailers in the area didn’t. You could buy a bike there, you could buy a basketball, you could buy a TV. There are so many things you’ll have to go out of the community to get,” Brookins said, adding the closing is a blow to the community.

Felicia McCranie, Walmart Spokesperson, said the reason for the store closures is because they were not profitable. While Walmart wanted to invest in the stores and see if it could bring them back to a profitable status, unfortunately, the tough decision was made to close these stores. According to McCranie, there were some community classes that took place at the Walmart Academy, including HVAC, tech classes and resume writing.

Walmart is planning to host job fairs for current employees with the hope they can be placed at other locations. Beyond Sunday, associates will be paid their hourly regular wage until Aug. 11th. After Aug. 11th, associates who are eligible will receive severance pay. The goal is to give them enough time to find a job. “Our associates are the beat of our company; we wouldn’t have Walmart without our associates. This has nothing to do with their amazing work. In each of these stores, we’ve got amazing stories of achievements from associates in these stores,” she said.

McCranie said the intention was that the investments Walmart made to the locations would improve store performance, but the efforts haven’t improved the business challenges the stores were facing. She added, Walmart appreciated the opportunity to serve the customers in these communities and the hope is to continue to serve them in the surrounding stores.

On Thursday, April 13th, elected officials and community leaders gathered to protest the store’s closing. Even then, the parking lot was full and people were coming in and out of the store with their carts full. The 21^st Ward Alderman-elect Mosley said he was working on a resource guide of places where constituents could get the items they normally bought at Walmart. He also wants to have a community meeting to discuss what residents want to see in the space once the store closes.

“That’s a huge disruption to this community. They didn’t give us any time to plan how we could still fill or work to fill these voids. We are reacting to the closing, that’s not a good place to be. We want to be proactive, we want to plan for our community to thrive,” he said.

Cook County Commissioner Stanley Moore also received calls from constituents when they heard about the Walmart closing. One of Moore’s constituent’s daughter’s works at Walmart and gets college tuition reimbursement. Another constituent is working at Walmart while going to Loyola.

“This was the purpose for bringing Walmart to this community in the first place. We fought for Walmart to be here. This was a vacant lot and we wanted Walmart to come, because we said, ‘our children deserve to be able to not leave their community in order to have a part-time job, or summer job, or a job just to help them get through school, or if some of our seniors want to work. They shouldn’t have to drive downtown or to the suburbs in order to be gainfully employed,” Moore said. Moore said it is a shame to lose Walmart after fighting to bring it to the community and making it through the pandemic.

The elected officials and community leaders want to meet with Walmart leadership and ask them to reconsider.

The other locations Walmart is closing are the Neighborhood Markets at 4720 S. Cottage Grove, 2844 N. Broadway and 2551 W. Cermak.

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