After closing time today, Tar Heel sports fans will have one fewer place to buy merchandise of their favorite teams.
Carolina Pride sportswear, which manager John Hudson said has been at its 151 E. Franklin St. location since 1983, will close tonight. To help clear the store’s remaining inventory, all merchandise has been marked down to half off.
Hudson said employees had foreseen the closing, but had been hoping for a miracle to keep the store open.
“More money is going out than is coming in,” he said. “We’ve had a couple of weeks of moving the merchandise to close up.”
Carolina Pride is the most recent Franklin Street business to close. In March, landmark Chapel Hill restaurant Pepper’s Pizza closed, just months after Tomato Jake’s Pizzeria and Jack Sprat Cafe also shut their doors.
Hudson said a combination of factors, including declining profits, contributed to the decision to close. He said while he’s talked to people from other businesses on Franklin Street about the business climate downtown, few are willing to discuss when they are struggling.
“I have anecdotal evidence, and I certainly talk to other business owners on the street,” he said. “No business owner that is in trouble is going to tell me that. Not unless he or she is nuts.”
He said the business’ doors will stay open as long as he can stay there tonight.
“We’re probably here until the business just dies.”
