Bacolod City, Jan. 15, 1998 - Retail giant Shoemart will shut down three SM supermarkets in Bacolod before the end of February.
"We can no longer stem the bleeding," admits Gerardo Luzurriaga, chairman of Cebu Storehouse Unlimited which operates SM stores in the Visayas. CSU is co-owned by Luzurriaga and Henry Sy, owner of Shoemart.
Close to 300 workers and personnel, including merchandisers, will be laid off by the closures.
Luzurriaga cited high operating costs, particularly the price of electricity, as a major obstacle. His 2,500-square meter store has a monthly electric bill of P400,000 while another branch that's only half the size consumes P300,000 worth of power.
The current economic crunch, he said, aggravated the situation because shoppers started to stay away from supermarkets and returned to the traditional wet markets.
Reported by: Sol Jose Vanzi
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