Bed Bath & Beyond has somehow managed to go bankrupt despite the fact that there are more US residents than ever who still presumably need bedrooms and bathrooms:
The once-dominant home goods retailer Bed Bath & Beyond has filed for bankruptcy protection after months of losing shoppers and money.
The company, which also owns the BuyBuy Baby chain, has struggled to regain its financial footing after a series of turnaround attempts that proved to be mistimed or ineffective.
“Millions of customers have trusted us through the most important milestones in their lives – from going to college to getting married, settling into a new home to having a baby,” said Sue Gove, the company’s president and CEO. “Our teams have worked with incredible purpose to support and strengthen our beloved banners, Bed Bath & Beyond and buybuy BABY. We deeply appreciate our associates, customers, partners, and the communities we serve, and we remain steadfastly determined to serve them throughout this process.”
The company said that for now its 360 Bed Bath & Beyond and 120 BuyBuy Baby stores and websites would remain open, but that over time they would be closed.
Since first warning of a bankruptcy in January, the company has exhausted numerous last-ditch efforts to shore up financing, including store closures, job cuts and several lifelines from banks and investors.
Bed Bath & Beyond previously cited “lower customer traffic and reduced levels of inventory availability” as it flagged “substantial doubt about the company’s ability to continue as a going concern.” A preliminary report for the holiday-season quarter showed sales falling 40% to 50% from a year earlier. Sales had fallen similarly in the quarter before that, down 32%.
Bed Bath & Beyond was once a dominant “category killer” that absorbed or outlived many early rivals. As recently as 2018, the chain had over 1,500 stores.
Economic centralization is a community killer. We see the pattern again and again and again. A financialized corporation devours all of the local suppliers, takes over the entire industry, then somehow manages to go bankrupt despite the fact that it doesn’t have any serious competitors.
How is this even possible? The answer is straightforward: vampire finance.
As recently as 2022, Bed Bath & Beyond’s revenue was higher than it was in 2009. But by then, it was already seen as being in trouble and on its way out. The problem, of course, is financialization and the systematic draining of profit from the financialized corporation’s operations. A healthy company pours its resources back into the business and grows as a result, leaving everyone better off. A dying company is one that has had its resources methodically drained from it by the financial vampires, thereby leaving everyone worse off except the people who killed it.