- Sales at Kohl’s fell in Q3, which CEO Tom Kingsbury called “frankly disappointing.”
- I visited a Kohl’s store in New Jersey to see how the chain plans to bounce back.
- The store’s layout showed how Kohl’s is centering its partnership with Sephora to boost sales.
In 2018, Kohl’s was hailed as a “winner of the retail apocalypse,” boasting strong sales over its struggling counterparts like Sears and JCPenney.
Now, Kohl’s is feeling the strain. Its third-quarter earnings report found that net sales decreased 8.8% and comparable sales fell 9.3%.
“We are not satisfied with our performance in 2024 and are taking aggressive action to reverse the sales declines,” CEO Tom Kingsbury said in the report.
Kingsbury also announced that he would step down as CEO effective January 15 and will be replaced by Ashley Buchanan, a Kohl’s board member and CEO of Michael’s.
I visited a Kohl’s store ahead of the holidays in December, one of the busiest shopping seasons, to see what kind of “aggressive action” Kohl’s was taking to boost sales.
Representatives for Kohl’s did not respond to a request for comment.
