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Recession Blues: Fresh & Easy to Temporarily Close 13 Stores
Produce at the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market in South L.A. (Lindsay William-Ross/LAist)
Before you freak out, the stores are not in the immediate Los Angeles area. Just as El Segundo-based Fresh & Easy's parent company Tesco announced a 15% profit for the first half of 2010, it also said it would be doing some belt tightening in the American Southwest. 13 underperforming stores will be closed, mostly in the Phoenix and Las Vegas metros. One in Southern California, the Moreno Valley one, will also shutter, according to the blog Fresh & Easy Buzz. The stores could re-open in a couple years if the economy recovers.
A company spokesperson could not tell LAist if more area stores were coming or not. Last month, stores opened in San Diego and Oceanside.
Another big-name retailer, Barnes & Noble, recently announced it will close two of their stores in Encino and Calabasas in December. In Encino, residents are campaigning on Facebook to keep it from leaving their neighborhood.
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You come to LAist because you want independent reporting and trustworthy local information. Our nonprofit newsroom doesn’t answer to shareholders looking to turn a profit. Instead, we answer to you and our communities. We are free to follow facts wherever they lead and to hold power to account without fear or favor. Our only loyalty is to our readers and listeners and our mission: to inform, engage, and strengthen Southern California’s communities.
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