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The death of Joann fabrics is turning out to be a big gain for at least one other retailer. Following the beloved craft chains bankruptcy and subsequent plan to wind down its operations, discount retailer Burlington Storesformerly known as Burlington Coat Factoryis moving to scoop up dozens of leases from former Joann locations across more than 20 states, court documents reveal. The 45 locations, some of which have been home to Joanns stores for decades, were listed as being taken over by various Burlington subsidiaries on a bankruptcy court filing last week, with the company expected to assume control of most of the leases on June 1. In January, Joann filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection for a second time in less than a year, having succumbed to inflationary pressures and shifting habits among consumers who had embraced at-home crafts during the early years of the pandemic. The company has since said it would close every location, with a sizable chunk of those stores closing for good last week. All of Joann’s almost 800 stores are expected to be closed by the end of May. The relatively quick wind-down creates an opportunity for other retailers that are looking for space, with leases available for low cure amounts or no cure price at all, court records show. The transfer of leases to Burlington is not a done deal, as interested parties still have time to object. Fast Company reached out to Burlington for comment and additional details. ‘2,000-store target’ Headquartered in Burlington, New Jersey, Burlington Stores offers merchandise at so-called off prices, specializing in apparel, footwear, and of course coats. The company formerly known as Burlington Coat Factory earned $504 million in profit on revenue of $10.6 billion in fiscal 2024. Last week’s filing shows Texas as the state with the most Joann stores that will be transferred to Burlington, with nine locations in the Lone Star state, followed by California with five. The filing also offers a window into the growth plans of a brick-and-mortar brand with ambitions to significantly increase its store count. While many chain retailers have reduced their physical footprint or shuttered entirely over the past few years, Burlington has been growing at a healthy clip. The company opened more than 100 net new stores in 2024, CEO Michael OSullivan said in an earnings release in March, and it plans to open another 100 locations this year. Burlington has also been relocating dozens of locations that OSullivan described as oversized, part of a national trend in which retailers are trying to do more with smaller-format stores. As of the end of its last fiscal year, Burlington operated 1,108 stores in 46 states, along with Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. It has said it has a long-term target of 2,000 stores. In addition to Burlington, the filing also listed other retailers that were taking over a handful of Joann locations, including Hobby Lobby, Boot Barn, and furniture retailer Massa Gallery. Below you can find the full list of locations that Burlington is seeking to take over. The oldest lease on the list, in Flagstaff, Arizona, dates back to April 1979. Arizona 1717 N Dysart Road in Avondale, AZ 1514 S Riordan Ranch St in Flagstaff, AZ Arkansas 3835 North Mall Ave in Fayetteville, AR California 5885 Lincoln Avenue in Buena Park, CA 26583 Carl Boyer Drive in Santa Clarita, CA 2210 Daniels St in Manteca, CA 3010 Ming Ave in Bakersfield, CA 12779 Main Street in Hesperia, CA Colorado 2580 South Colorado Blvd in Denver, CO 7360 South Gartrell Road in Aurora, CO Florida 10261 River Marsh Drive Ste 149 in Jacksonville, FL 540 N us Hwy 441 in Lady Lake, FL 1131 S Federal Hwy in Pompano Beach, FL Georgia 2655 N. Decatur Road, Decatur, GA 1074 Bullsboro Drive Unit #6 in Newnan, GA Illinois 7511 Lemont Rd Ste 101 in Darien, IL 2056 N. State Route 50, Bourbonnais, IL Kentucky 4600 Shelbyville Rd Ste 280 in Louisville, KY Massachusetts 96 Providence Highway in East Walpole, MA Michigan 9052 Highland Road in White Lake, MI Mississippi 3875 North Gloster Street in Tupelo, MS Nebraska 10521 S. 15Th Street in Bellevue, NE New Mexico 558 E. Main St., Farmington, NM New York 3225 State Route 364 in Canandaigua, NY 1530 County Route 64 in Horseheads, NY North Carolina 80 South Tunnel Road Suite 30 in Asheville, NC Ohio 4600 W Broad Street in Columbus, OH 3872 Paxton Avenue, Cincinnati, OH Boardman Poland Road, Youngstown, OH Oregon 783 Lancaster Dr. Ne. Suite #133 in Salem, OR South Carolina 1120 Seaboard Street, Myrtle Beach, SC 1215-B North Main Street in Summerville, SC Texas 1219 North Fry Road in Katy, TX 10515 N Mo Pac Expy Bldg 1 in Austin, TX 9500 S I-35 Frontage Rd. Building K, Austin, TX 4127 N Hwy 75 in Sherman, TX 2640 West University Dr in Denton, TX 2050 West Unversity Dr Suite 250 in Mc Kinney, TX 19105 Lyndon B Johnson Fwy., Mesquite, TX 10501 Gateway Blvd W Bld 9 in El Paso, TX 201 University Oaks Blvd in Round Rock, TX Utah 720 W. Telegraph in Washington, UT Washington 700 Ocean Beach Hwy Ste 100 in Longview, WA Wisconsin 1226 Koeller St in Oshkosh, WI 4045 Commonwealth Ave in Eau Claire, WI
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E-Commerce
Pharrell Williams has high hopes for the Met Gala, the first to focus exclusively on Black designers, and the first in more than 20 years to have a menswear theme.“I want it to feel like the most epic night of power, a reflection of Black resiliency in a world that continues to be colonized, by which I mean policies and legislation that are nothing short of that,” he recently told Vogue.“It’s our turn.”Indeed. And welcome to the first Monday in May. How to watch the 2025 Met Gala Vogue will livestream the gala starting at 6 p.m. Eastern on Vogue.com, its YouTube channel and across its other digital platforms. Teyana Taylor, La La Anthony and Ego Nwodim will host the stream. Emma Chamberlain will also do interviews on the carpet.The Associated Press will livestream celebrity departures from the Mark Hotel beginning at 5 p.m. Eastern and will stream the gala carpet on delay beginning at 6:30 p.m. The feeds will be available on YouTube and APNews.com.E! will begin live coverage at 6 p.m. on TV. The livestream will be available on Peacock, E! Online and YouTube, along with the network’s other social media feeds. Who’s hosting the 2025 Met Gala? This year, the fundraising gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is hosted by a group of Black male celebrities, including Williams, the musical artist and Louis Vuitton menswear director, and Lewis Hamilton, Colman Domingo, and A$AP Rocky, with NBA superstar LeBron James as honorary chair. They’re joined by Vogue’s Anna Wintour, the mastermind behind the gala, considered the year’s biggest and starriest party.Also guaranteed to show up is a second tier of hosts from a variety of worlds: athletes Simone Biles and husband Jonathan Owens; Angel Reese and Sha’Carri Richardson; filmmakers Spike Lee, Tonya Lewis Lee and Regina King; actors Ayo Edebiri, Audra McDonald and Jeremy Pope; musicians Doechii, Usher, Tyla, Janelle Monáe and André 3000; author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie; artists Jordan Casteel, Rashid Johnson and Kara Walker; playwrights Jeremy O. Harris and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins; and fashion figures Grace Wales Bonner, Edward Enninful, Dapper Dan and Olivier Rousteing.The gala raises the bulk of the curation budget for the museum’s Costume Institute. This year’s Met Gala dress code is It’s more like a firm suggestion. From Wintour. This year, it’s about tailoring and suiting as interpreted through the history and meaning of Black dandyism across the Atlantic diaspora. The theme is inspired by the annual spring exhibition, which this year is based in large part on “Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity,” a book written by Monica L. Miller. She is guest curator of the exhibit.“Historical manifestations of dandyism range from absolute precision in dress and tailoring to flamboyance and fabulousness in dress and style,” Miller writes in the exhibit catalog. “Whether a dandy is subtle or spectacular, we recognize and respect the deliberateness of the dress, the self-conscious display, the reach for tailored perfection, and the sometimes subversive self-expression.”How the dress code goes, in terms of taste and style, is anyone’s guess. Wintour has a hand in virtually all things gala, so the presumption is things can’t go too far off the rails. She recently knocked down the rumor that she approves all looks, telling “Good Morning America” she’ll weigh in if asked.The exhibit, “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style,” draws on other sources beyond Miller’s book. It’s organized into 12 sections. Each symbolizes a characteristic of dandy style as defined by Zora Neale Hurston in her 1934 essay, “Characteristics of Negro Expression.”Among them: ownership, presence, distinction, disguise, freedom, respectability and heritage. Presumably, for gala guests who do deep-dive research (or have stylists to do it), some of these factors will play out on the museum steps that serve as the event’s red carpet. Who else is going to show up? The guest list amounts to about 450 high-profile people from tech, sports, art, entertainment and more. The mix, Williams said, is a must.“It’s so important to me to have successful Black and brown people of every stripe in the room: not just athletes and actors and actresses, entertainers, but also authors, architects, folks from the fintech world,” he told Vogue. “We’ve got to invest in each other. We’ve got to connect with each other, because it’s going to take everybody to coalesce the force of Black and brown genius into one strong, reliable force.” For full coverage of the Met Gala, visit: https://apnews.com/hub/met-gala Leanne Italie, AP Lifestyles Writer
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E-Commerce
President Donald Trump is opening a new salvo in his tariff war, targeting films made outside the U.S.In a post Sunday night on his Truth Social platform, Trump said he has authorized the Department of Commerce and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to slap a 100% tariff “on any and all Movies coming into our Country that are produced in Foreign Lands.”“The Movie Industry in America is DYING a very fast death,” he wrote, complaining that other countries “are offering all sorts of incentives to draw” filmmakers and studios away from the U.S. “This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat. It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda!”It wasn’t immediately clear how any such tariff on international productions could be implemented. It’s common for both large and small films to include production in the U.S. and in other countries. Big-budget movies like the upcoming “Mission: ImpossibleThe Final Reckoning,” for instance, are shot around the world.Incentive programs for years have influenced where movies are shot, increasingly driving film production out of California and to other states and countries with favorable tax incentives, like Canada and the United Kingdom.Yet Trump’s tariffs are designed to lead consumers toward American products. And in movie theaters, American-produced movies overwhelming dominate the domestic marketplace.China has ramped up its domestic movie production, culminating in the animated blockbuster “Ne Zha 2” grossing more than $2 billion this year. But even then, its sales came almost entirely from mainland China. In North America, it earned just $20.9 million.In New Zealand, where successive governments have offered rebates and incentives in recent years to draw Hollywood films to the country, the film industry has generated billions of dollars in tourism revenue driven by the “Lord of the Rings” and “Hobbit” films, which featured the country’s pristine and scenic vistas. More recently, the blockbuster “Minecraft” movie was filmed entirely in New Zealand, and U.S. productions in 2023 delivered $1.3 billion New Zealand dollars ($777 million) to the country in return for NZ$200 million in subsidies, according to government figures.New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said he was awaiting more details of Trump’s measures before commenting on them but would continue to pitch to filmmakers abroad, including in India’s Bollywood. “We’ve got an absolutely world class industry,” he said. “This is the best place to make movies, period, in the world.”The Motion Picture Association, which represents major U.S. film studios and streaming services, didn’t immediately respond to messages Sunday evening.The MPA’s data shows how much Hollywood exports have dominated cinemas. According to the MPA, the American movies produced $22.6 billion in exports and $15.3 billion in trade surplus in 2023.Trump, a Republican, has made good on the “tariff man” label he gave himself years ago, slapping new taxes on goods made in countries around the globe. That includes a 145% tariff on Chinese goods and a 10% baseline tariff on goods from other countries, with even higher levies threatened.By unilaterally imposing tariffs, Trump has exerted extraordinary influence over the flow of commerce, creating political risks and pulling the market in different directions. There are tariffs on autos, steel and aluminum, with more imports, including pharmaceutical drugs, set to be subject to new tariffs in the weeks ahead.Trump has long voiced concern about movie production moving overseas.Shortly before he took office, he announced that he had tapped actors Mel Gibson, Jon Voight and Sylvester Stallone to serve as “special ambassadors” to Hollywood to bring it “BACKBIGGER, BETTER, AND STRONGER THAN EVER BEFORE!”U.S. film and television production has been hampered in recent years, with setbacks from the COVID-19 pandemic, the Hollywood guild strikes of 2023 and the recent wildfires in the Los Angeles area. Overall production in the U.S. was down 26% last year compared with 2021, according to data from ProdPro, which tracks production.The group’s annual survey of executives, which asked about preferred filming locations, found no location in the U.S. made the top five, according to the Hollywood Reporter. Toronto, the U.K., Vancouver, Central Europe and Australia came out on top, with California placing sixth, Georgia seventh, New Jersey eighth and New York ninth.The problem is especially acute in California. In the greater Los Angeles area, production last year was down 5.6% from 2023 according to FilmLA, second only to 2020, during the peak of the coronavirus pandemic. Last, October, Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, proposed expanding California’s Film & Television Tax Credit program to $750 million annually, up from $330 million.Other U.S. cities like Atlanta, New York, Chicago, and San Francisco have also used aggressive tax incentives to lure film and TV productions. Those programs can take the form of cash grants, as in Texas, or tax credits, which Georgia and New Mexico offer.“Other nations have been stealing the movie-making capabilities from the United States,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Sunday night after returning from a weekend in Florida. “If they’re not willing to make a movie inside the United States we should have a tariff on movies that come in.” Associated Press writers Gary Field in Washington and Charlotte Graham-McLay in Wellington, New Zealand, contributed to this report from Washington. Jill Colvin and Jake Coyle, Associated Press
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E-Commerce
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