SEATTLE — After filing for bankruptcy on Sunday, Rite Aid court filings Tuesday showed the troubled drugstore chain plans to close 154 locations, or 7 percent of its portfolio nationwide, including 11 in Washington.
Rite Aid confirmed Thursday that of the 11 Washington locations on the list, six Rite Aid and Bartell Drugs stores will shutter next month; the other five closed last month.
The six stores that are scheduled to close in November are two Rite Aid locations in Mill Creek and Everett and four Bartell Drugs stores in Redmond, Bellevue and Lynnwood.
The five that already closed are four Rite Aid stores in Renton; Burien; Graham, Pierce County; and Lacey, Thurston County; and one Bartell Drugs in Seattle. After these 11 closures, Rite Aid will be left with just 53 Bartell stores and 30 Seattle-area Rite Aid locations.
Washington had 67 Bartell Drugs locations when Rite Aid bought the chain in 2020 for $95 million.
A filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday shows Pennsylvania-based Rite Aid has $3.78 billion in total debt and paid $330 million for “facility exit and impairment charges.” The company’s quarterly loss was about $1 billion.
The Chapter 11 bankruptcy is meant to restructure Rite Aid, which is struggling with competition from larger CVS and Walgreens and facing costly opioid-related lawsuits. According to some analysts, Rite Aid could either sell its pharmacy business or try to raise money by closing underperforming locations.
“Really, the two options are, do they sell their current pharmacy [business] to another pharmacy, and the new pharmacy just rebrands it to their name, or does Rite Aid just close down and just sell its physical real estate?” Arun Sundaram, a senior analyst at CFRA Research, said Monday.
The stores that are scheduled to close are:
- 10103 Evergreen Way, Everett (Rite Aid) will close Nov. 6.
- 3620 Factoria Blvd. S.E., Bellevue (Bartell Drugs) will close Nov. 9.
- 3202 132nd St. S.E., Mill Creek (Rite Aid) will close Nov. 12.
- 7370 170th Ave. N.E., Redmond (Bartell Drugs) will close Nov. 12.
- 2518 196th St. S.W., Lynnwood (Bartell Drugs) will close Nov. 14.
- 11919 N.E. Eighth St., Bellevue (Bartell Drugs) will close Nov. 16.
