Fashion retailer Nordstrom has announced it is withdrawing from the Canadian market, shuttering all of its stores on this side of the border as it renews its focus on its U.S. operations.

The news came alongside the company’s fourth quarter earnings report late Thursday afternoon, which showed net sales down across the board, declining 2.4% for the Nordstrom banner and 8.1% for Nordstrom Rack year-over-year, while gross merchandise value was down 2.5%.

Digital sales – which represented 40% of total sales in Q4 and 38% of sales for the year – were also down 13.1% compared with Q4 2021.

“We took decisive actions to right-size our inventory as we entered the new year, positioning us for greater agility amidst continuing macroeconomic uncertainty. We also made the difficult decision to wind down operations in our Canadian business. This will enable us to simplify our operations and further increase our focus on driving long-term profitable growth in our core U.S. business,” explained Erik Nordstrom, CEO for the retailer, during the announcement.

“We entered Canada in 2014 with a plan to build and sustain a long-term business there,” he added. “Despite our best efforts, we do not see a realistic path to profitability for the Canadian business.”

The company’s six Nordstrom and seven Nordstrom Rack stores in Canada will wind down by late June. The Canadian ecommerce site ceased operations late Thursday. The retailer employs approximately 2,500 people in Canada.

The retailer entered the market with DDB Canada as its creative AOR, primarily working on regional-specific campaigns promoting new store openings. Nordstrom had moved its creative to Ogilvy by the time of its first Canada-specific national campaign in 2018, which focused on the “cultural values” the company wanted to be a part of with its entry here.

Similarly, the company had entered Canada working with Omnicom Media Group as its media agency, before moving to Mindshare in 2015.

Photo courtesy of Matthew Manuel/Unsplash.