Famed horror writer Edgar Allen Poe would have a field day with this one: A black bird perched atop the red circular Circuit City sign in Canarsie’s Gateway Plaza Mall just days after the electronics giant announced that they were shutting all of their stores down.
If the bird/crow/raven/whatever whispered “Nevermore,” no one heard it.
Yet the gloomy sight was symbolic of the mood of employees inside, although none of the future former employees would say so.
In fact, no one would say anything about the corporate headquarters announcement that they have officially gone under at 567 stores across the U.S. — three of which call Brooklyn home. The three stores are located at the Gateway Plaza Mall, inside the Atlantic Center Mall at Flatbush and Atlantic Avenues and on 86th Street near Fifth Avenue in Bay Ridge.
Repeated attempts for comment at all three stores were fruitless. A call to the Atlantic Center Mall location was hung up on.
A manager at the Bay Ridge location said that no one was allowed to talk to reporters.
Employees approached in the Circuit City at Gateway Plaza — where all merchandise was slashed from 20 to 30 percent — refused to comment, with one employee shaking their head no through clenched jaws.
Customers trying to bank on the closeout prices saw the closure as the sign of the times.
“My question is what’s going to be closed next,” said one customer, who would only identify herself as Anne. “Nobody’s shopping anymore. I haven’t spent a dime since Christmas.”
Officials at Circuit City said that the closures were “due to the challenges to our business and the continued bleak economic environment.”
The stores will be open until all of the merchandise is sold off to pay off the parent company’s debtors, officials said.
Store employees will continue to be paid and receive benefits for 60 days, when the stores are supposed to be shuttered for good.
Circuit City, considered the second largest consumer electronics retailer in the country, announced their liquidation after failing to find the financing needed to pay off its creditors. The liquidation sale started the weekend after the closures were announced.
“The process was extremely difficult and we were left with no other choice but to liquidate,” according to a statement released by the company. “Circuit City had a proud heritage of serving the public for 60 years and we deeply regret the impact this decision will have on our associates, our customers and the communities where we have operated stores and other facilities.”
The writing was on the wall for several months. Back in November, their bleak economic forecast led the company to close 155 of their stores — including the Circuit City at the new Triangle at the Junction mall.
That Circuit City had only been opened three months before it was forced to shut down, officials said.
