Petland Discounts at 71-08 Kissena Blvd., one of 70 locations closing in New York. (Google Maps)
Jan. 31, 2019 By Nathaly Pesantez
Petland Discounts will be shutting down operations across dozens of New York stores, including a handful of locations in Queens, according to state filings.
The company will be closing 70 locations in the five boroughs, Nassau and Westchester, and is laying off the 367 employees that staffed the sites in coming months, according to a Jan. 18 filing with the state Department of Labor.
Petland Discounts Inc. anticipates closing all of the listed stores by April 18, with all employees to be laid off by then. It is unclear if the affected locations represent all the stores in the state.
Reports add that the company, founded in 1965, is also closing stores in New Jersey and Connecticut based on filings with respective states’ labor departments.
It is unclear why the retail pet store chain is closing, although the company indicated financial reasons in its state filing.
The closures come two weeks after Neil Padron, the Queens-based founder of the chain, died of bladder cancer on Jan. 14. He was 74.
Amy Eisenberg, his daughter, indicated that the family is still working out what to do in light of his death.
“He was the sole proprietor,” Eisenberg told Newsday. “We are trying to figure everything out.”
