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SHOPPERS are mourning the impending death of the last full-sized Kmart store on the mainland, bemoaning the chain “went downhill”.
The last store, located on Long Island, New York in Bridgehampton, is closing in October, according to reports.
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It leaves just one small Kmart store in Miami, with a handful in Guam and the US Virgin Islands.
Reacting to the demise on Reddit, one shopper said lamented how the chain failed to keep up with the times.
They said: “They went downhill seemingly very rapidly.
“Growing up there was one near me where we did all of our shopping.
“It carried everything, even tank lobsters, and it was always clean.
“Then at some point it was like Walmart and Target kept modernizing with the times, and Kmart just stayed in 1995 forever.”
Others were nostalgic about their Kmart childhood memories.
One comment said: “I have good memories of shopping at Kmart with my parents back in the day.
“There was something special about the store that was lost towards the end though.”
Multiple people are remembering Kmart for its “amazing restaurant” and “good food”.
Kmart at its peak had a bumper 2,300 stores in the US in the 1990s.
But it struggled to compete with Walmart’s lower prices, while Target propelled ahead as it was seen to offer trendier options.
It closed hundreds of stores in the early 2000s as a consequence of struggling to keep pace with rivals.
Then online shopping took over with Amazon rising to the apex, which seemingly dealt the knockout blow.
Shoppers can claim 40 per cent off the Long Island store in a liquidation sale.
And Kmart is not the only retailer struggling as the industry continues grappling with the cost-of-living crisis that followed the pandemic.
As many as 21 big US chains and retailers filed for bankruptcy in the first half of this year, S&P said in July.
