If you’re used to buying your smartphones and smartphone accessories at Best Buy mobile phone stores located in your local mall, you’ll have to head to the big box stores or shop somewhere else. According to Reuters, Best Buy is closing 250 of their mobile phone kiosks in the U.S. effective May 31st. The closure doesn’t affect 52 of the company’s kiosks in Canada.
The move comes as the stores only contribute 1% of Best Buy’s total overall revenue and, likewise, only make up 1% of the company’s overall footprint. In a letter to employees, Hubert Joly (Best Buy Chief Executive) cited higher costs of operating the mobile stores compared to their big box stores as another reason for the closures.
“Fast forward to 2018 and the mobile phone business has matured, margins have compressed and the cost of operations in our mobile standalone stores is higher than in our big box stores.”
Best Buy will continue to sell smartphones and mobile accessories at their big box stores and online, and Joly also mentioned that 85% of the mobile stores are located within three miles of one of their 1,000 big box stores. There is no word as to how many jobs the closures will affect, but Best Buy is dedicated to helping those employees look for other positions within the company. Those who choose not to continue with Best Buy after May 31st will be offered a severance package and Best Buy will help them with their external job searches as well.
What do you think about Best Buy’s decision to shutter their mobile phone kiosks in the U.S.? Where do you normally buy your smartphones from? Let us know in the comments below or on Google+, Twitter, or Facebook.
[button link=”https://www.reuters.com/article/us-best-buy-stores/best-buy-plans-to-shut-250-small-u-s-mobile-phone-stores-idUSKCN1GC3D2″ icon=”fa-external-link” side=”left” target=”blank” color=”285b5e” textcolor=”ffffff”]Source: Reuters[/button]
