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Nakumatt Nextgen shut down nine months after opening

By HILARY KIMUYU September 8th, 2017 1 min read

Nakumatt Nextgen has been closed, barely nine months after it opened its doors to customers.

The retail chain announced the closure in a notice posted on the entrance of their store at the mall along Mombasa Road.

The notice said the outlet would remain closed from Saturday September 9 “until further notice”.

The notice.
The notice.

The branch, which was opened just nine in December 2016, was meant to tap into the customer base along Mombasa Road and its environs including areas such as South B and South C.

Nakumatt’s problems have been piling up with suppliers refusing to deliver their products until the debts are cleared, numerous court cases and striking employees, all these as a result of cash-flow challenges.

Earlier this week, Nakumatt Holdings Limited issued a statement saying the company was facing insolvency and thus unable to pay debts.

Nakumatt announced in May 2017 that they would be closing several branches across East Africa to reduce the cost of running the supermarkets and make the retailer profitable again.

The first store to be shut down was the Haile Selassie Branch located at the Kenyatta University Plaza, Nairobi which was closed in May and the premises handed back to the university, which is the landlord.

The chain, however, did not disclose the total number of branches that will cease operations under the strategy.