Led by a decline in department stores and other big-box retailers, the ongoing wave of retail store closings in the U.S. is expected to continue unabated in 2019, with more than 4,000 retail locations already scheduled for liquidation according to recent reports in the business media.
In particular, this trend is having a substantial impact on the character of shopping malls and strip malls. Retail industry analysts generally attribute this phenomenon to the saturation of retail stores occurring in previous years combined with the rise of online retailers. More than half of all the 2019 closings announced this year stem from the recent decision by Payless ShoeSource to close 2,100 stores in the U.S.
https://moneywise.com/a/retailers-closing-stores-in-2019
https://www.businessinsider.com/stores-closing-this-year-2019-2
