Shoppers flock to closing Rock Hill stores for Black Friday deals

An oversized yellow store closing sign on the side of Kmart and Sears in Rock Hill enticed shoppers to stop by Thursday and Friday.

Inside, the hundreds of brightly colored clearance sale and percentages off signs showed shoppers how much they could save.

Jessica Gebhardt said she doesn’t usually shop on Black Friday. But this year, she had been to three Sears stores by noon.

“I’m Sears-hopping — the ones that are closing at least,” she said.

Both Kmart and Sears in Rock Hill will soon be closing their doors permanently, store officials have said.

Brittany Griffin stopped in Kmart on Thanksgiving Day to take advantage of clearance items.

“I just decided to go out shopping after lunch with my mom,” Griffin said. “She saw that there was a lot of clearance stuff and they were going out of business.”

Debbie Neff cruised the toy aisles looking for deals for her grandchildren after having a big lunch with a group of friends and family.

“One of the ladies in the group said Kmart was closing down and was open, so we thought we would stop here on the way home,” Neff said.

There were about 100 people in the Rock Hill Galleria Sears at noon Friday. The store announced Nov. 8 the Rock Hill location will be closing by February.

Weeks before the announcement, Sears Holdings announced Kmart on Cherry Road is closing by the end of the year.

The moves are part of hundreds of Sears and Kmart stores that are closing, as Sears Holdings works through bankruptcy proceedings.

The Kmart site has been sold for $6 million to a Charlotte-based apartment and self-storage group, Madison Capital.

Sears has been an anchor store at Galleria since the mall opened in 1991.

The nearest remaining Sears stores after the Rock Hill closing will be an outlet in Charlotte and a showroom in Huntersville, N.C.

This story was originally published November 23, 2018 at 2:21 PM.