Decathlon To Close Five Toronto-area Sporting Goods Stores

Decathlon To Close Five Toronto-area Sporting Goods Stores

French chain to cease operations in Vaughan, Brampton, Burlington, Markham and Scarborough, considers opening smaller stores

Decathlon is closing five of its 20 stores in Canada, all in the Toronto area, after the French sporting goods chain expanded aggressively following its arrival in 2018.

The sporting goods retailer said it will close its stores in Vaughan, Brampton, Burlington, Markham and Scarborough, which range in size between 35,000 and 65,000 square feet.

The retailer also said it may look to open other stores in the Greater Toronto Area in smaller spaces.

ā€œWe are also considering a return to brick-and-mortar stores with a smaller footprint in the GTA,ā€ it said in a statement. Decathlon did not indicate when it planned to close the stores.

The planned closings come as the Toronto area’s retail market, which contains about 300 million square feet, has an overallĀ vacancy rate of just 1.5%, according to CoStar Market Analytics. However, the closure of 32 Hudson’s Bay department stores in Ontario earlier this year is expected to push the retail vacancy rate up slightly in Canada’s most populous province.

The pending Decathlon vacancies could provide competition for several retail landlords, including La Caisse, formerly known as Ivanhoe Cambridge, Cadillac Fairview, and Oxford Properties, that are working to backfill the Hudson’s Bay outlets that were vacated this year in the same shopping centres in Burlington, Markham and Scarborough.

Decathlon’s competitors in Canada include Walmart, Canadian Tire, Mountain Equipment Co-op, Sail, Plein Air and Sporting Life.

Decathlon operates 1,700 stores in 72 countries. The global retailer based in Villeneuve d’Ascq, France, named Javier López CEO earlier this year, replacing Barbara Martin Coppola, who had led the company since 2022. Nicolas Roucou serves as the named CEO of Decathlon Canada.

Source CoStar. Click here for the full story.

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