Advance Auto Parts Shuttering Hundreds of Locations; Here’s Why

An auto parts retailer with thousands of stores across the U.S. has announced plans to close locations as it attempt to improve its business.

Rough Year For Retail

It hasn’t been an easy year for several retail chains that have needed to declare bankruptcy or just shutdown completely.

In just the past two months alone, we’ve seen:

NOTE: FULL LIST OF CLOSED RETAIL CHAINS FOLLOWS BELOW

It hasn’t been much better for the chain restaurant industry which also has been hit hard by closures in 2024.

Now, it appears the automotive sector may be hurting as Advance Auto Parts has announced an aggressive plan reduce its footprint.

How Many Advance Auto Parts Stores Are Closing?

Advance Auto Parts announced to investors on Thursday that it will begin a “strategic plan” to cutdown on the number of properties that are part of its operation. For now, the plan calls for:

• Closing 523 Advance Auto Parts corporate stores
• Exiting 204 independent locations
• Closing four distribution centers

An exact timeline for the company to enact the plan as not yet been announced. We do know Advance is targeting having its distribution centers consolidated into “13 large facilities” by 2026.

It is important to note the “strategic plan” presented to investors this week didn’t exclusively rely on closing facilities. There are still plans for new additions in the future.

Advance plans to accelerate “in pace of new store openings.” It also plans to open 60 market hub locations by the middle of 2027 to shore up its supply chain issue.

The first Advance stores opened in 1929. As of the beginning of October, the company was operating more than 4,700 locations in the U.S. and Canada. Advance also serves another 1,125 locations that are independently owned by Carquest.