After months of a looming closure, JCPenney will shutter its Westfield Annapolis Mall location and lay off 65 employees there in August.

The Texas-based retail company was unable to negotiate a long-term lease or find another suitable location in the area, a spokesperson told The Baltimore Banner on Tuesday.

The closure doesn’t come as a surprise. JCPenney, a long-time anchor tenant at the Annapolis Mall, announced in February that it would close that store and seven others among more than 650 nationwide locations.

Its Annapolis Mall store was set to close May 12, with around 74 workers affected, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) notice JCPenney filed in March with the Maryland Department of Labor.

The Baltimore Banner thanks its sponsors. Become one.

But plans changed in April. All of the store’s liquidation signs were removed and replaced with “now hiring” signage, the Baltimore Sun reported. The retailer was able to extend its lease with the new mall owner Centennial and stay open until August.

Now, nearly two months later, JCPenney is closing its doors, laying off 65 employees as part of its Aug. 17 closure, according to a new WARN notice filed this month.

“Unfortunately, we were not able to negotiate a long-term lease for the JCPenney store at the Westfield Annapolis Mall in Annapolis, MD and have been unable to find another suitable location in the market,” a spokesperson for the company said in an email.

After the closure, Maryland will have 10 JCPenney stores remaining, including stores at the Mall in Columbia, White Marsh Mall and Marley Station Mall in Glen Burnie.

JCPenney was an anchor tenant of the Annapolis Mall for more than 40 years. It will be replaced by Hobby Lobby, Grocery Outlet and Onelife Fitness, the Banner previously reported.

The Baltimore Banner thanks its sponsors. Become one.

DICK’s House of Sport and Dave & Buster’s are set to open new locations in the shopping center.

JCPenney filed for bankruptcy in May 2020 and was sold to Simon Property Group and Brookfield Asset Management the same year.

In 2023, JCPenney and SPARC Group merged to create Catalyst Brands, which now operates hundreds of JCPenney stores and other brands, including Aéropostale, Brooks Brothers, Eddie Bauer, Lucky Brand, Nautica and the now-defunct Forever 21. Annapolis Mall’s Forever 21 location closed April 30.

JCPenney is one of several retailers that are shuttering brick-and-mortar locations. Big Lots, Party City and JOANN closed all of their locations earlier this year.