Sears stores in Coon Rapids and Mankato will close

The retail carnage that usually comes around every January is sweeping across the Twin Cities.

On Thursday, Sears Holdings said its Sears stores in Coon Rapids and Mankato are among the 150 unprofitable Sears and Kmart stores it's closing in its latest round of store closures. The Kmart store in Detroit Lakes is also being shut down.

Last year, the struggling company closed the Sears store at Eden Prairie Center and a Kmart in West St. Paul.

The news comes one day after Macy's disclosed 68 of the 100 stores it plans to close, including its landmark in downtown Minneapolis on Nicollet Mall, a store that many Minnesotans still refer to as Dayton's. That store will close in March. Macy's is also shuttering its locations in Grand Forks, N.D. and La Crosse, Wis.

The women's clothing retailer the Limited is also shutting down its five metro area stores in the Twin Cities as well as many more across the nation as the chain heads toward bankruptcy. The last day for those stores will be Saturday.

This month is a popular time of year for retailers to prune their store portfolios after they assess their holiday sales and which stores continue to underperform. These rounds of store closures reflect how changing consumer habits, such as the shift toward online shopping and off-price chains, has hurt department stores and many mall-based stores.

Sears, which was once the largest U.S. retailer, has been losing money for years. On Thursday, it said that same-store sales at Sears and Kmart in the first two months of the holiday quarter declined between 12 and 13 percent.

"Many of these stores have struggled with their financial performance for years and we have kept them open to maintain local jobs and in the hope that they would turn around," CEO Eddie Lampert said in a statement. "But in order to meet our objective of returning to profitability, we have to make tough decisions and will continue to do so, which will give our better performing stores a chance at success."

The 150 store closings, which include 108 Kmart stores and 42 Sears stores, represent about 10 percent of the company's 1,500 stores. Liquidation sales will begin as soon as Friday and the stores will close by the end of March.

On Thursday, Sears also said it would sell its Craftsman tool brand to Stanley Black & Decker Inc. for about $900 million. Sears will continue to sell the products in its stores, but Stanley plans to expand the products' presence in other stores outside of Sears.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Kavita Kumar • 612-673-4113