The lights are dimming on Hudson’s Bay’s future, as the 355-year-old retailer prepares to put six stores it previously wanted to keep operational into liquidation on Friday.
Canada’s oldest company decided that it is “unlikely” to find a restructuring solution to save its business, said Adam Zalev, managing director of Hudson’s Bay’s financial adviser Reflect Advisor, in a court affidavit.
“The exclusion of the six stores from the liquidation sale is negatively impacting the Applicants’ realization efforts,” said Zalev.
“Given the low probability of receiving a viable bid based on the Six Store Model, the Applicants, in consultation with Reflect and the Monitor, have decided to include these six stores in the liquidation sale effective April 25, 2025,” he continued.
The six stores include its flagship store at Yonge and Queen streets in Toronto, the store at Yorkdale mall, one at Hillcrest Mall in Richmond Hill, as well as three locations in Quebec.
The move comes after the Superior Court of Justice approved the iconic Canadian department store chain to liquidate most of its business except for six stores while it engages in discussions with landlords and other interested parties to explore restructuring opportunities.
The company, which operates more than 80 Bay stores (36 located in Ontario), three Saks Fifth Avenue stores and 13 Saks Off 5th stores, filed for creditor protection on March 7 as it faced significant challenges, including trade war tensions with the U.S., and post-pandemic drops in downtown store traffic.
More than 9,000 jobs will be eliminated across the country if the company shuts its doors. The company has terminated over 200 corporate employees since the liquidation began, while confirming to the Star that there will be no severance pay when employees are laid off.
Since March 21, Hudson’s Bay has kicked off the lease monetization process and sales and investment solicitation process (SISP) in parallel, seeking to scout for parties interested in bidding for the leases of the company’s enormous retail footprint and its other assets, such as the trademarks.
According to a monitor’s report filed on Tuesday, 18 parties have expressed interest in a total of 65 individual leases, while 36 Hudson’s Bay leases drew no interest. The retailer is considering whether it wants to disclaim these leases and give them back to the landlords.
Multiple parties interested in the leases would also bid in the SISP, the court document read.
The company is still holding onto a sliver of hope that a successful bid will come through the SISP, and if so, Hudson’s Bay reserves the right to withdraw stores from liquidation sales.
The Star first reported that Weihong Liu, a B.C. billionaire and chairwoman of shopping centre owner/operator Central Walk, said she wants to buy “dozens” of stores on Chinese social media.
Hudson’s Bay will seek court approval on Thursday morning to appoint counsel for its thousands of employees facing potential layoffs and to auction off its collection of 1,700 pieces of art and more than 2,700 artifacts through a sale run by Heffel Gallery Limited.
The trove includes a royal charter granted by King Charles II in 1670, which paved the way for the founding of the fur-trading business and gave Hudson’s Bay vast land rights and sweeping control over trade and Indigenous relations for decades.
Over the past month, the retailer has received several letters from governments and Indigenous communities that have expressed deep concerns over the sale of artifacts with significant historical and cultural value.
“Selling these items at auction without full transparency and consultation with impacted First Nations would not only be morally irresponsible but also represent a continuation of the colonial dispossession of First Nations’ lands and belongings that the HBC directly profited from for centuries,” wrote Kyra Wilson, the grand chief of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs in a letter to Hudson’s Bay on April 22.
Wilson called on the department store chain to halt “any sale or transfer of artifacts that may belong to or be linked with First Nations” and to work with First Nations to review the art collection and explore options “for repatriation, shared stewardship, and respectful preservation.”
Additionally, Hudson’s Bay also received a letter from the Canada Advisory Committee for Memory of the World which requests the charter to be transferred to a public archival institution, such as the Archives of Manitoba.
This will “ensure that this internationally significant, unique, and irreplaceable document is not placed at risk during the transfer of corporate ownership,” the letter read.
