The corporate Schweser’s office announced this week it will close its store in the Northbridge Mall sometime this winter or spring.

The store, which has been in Albert Lea for about five years, sells misses and plus-size clothing, along with some children’s clothing.

It is one of more than 30 Schweser’s locations in Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska and South Dakota.

Ty Smith, spokesman for Schweser’s, said local sales have not kept pace with the continued increase in the cost of operating the store, such as freight and shipping costs and utilities.

“We wanted to keep giving the store a chance since we were very happy with the management of the store and because we believed in the town of Albert Lea,” Smith said. “We have had some record years as a company recently, and we were hoping that our store in Albert Lea would be able to turn it around and become very successful. Unfortunately there is a point at which continued investment in the store just doesn’t make sense.”

Smith said an exact date for the closing of the Albert Lea store has not yet been set.

“We would like to thank our loyal customers in Albert Lea for shopping with us the past five years,” said Ty Smith, with the corporate office of Schweser’s. “We are sorry to have to close this store, but we hope they will visit our stores in other nearby towns such as Fairmont and Algona since these stores will not be impacted by this.”

Smith also thanked the store’s employees, who he said served the store well, along with Northbridge Mall management, who worked diligently to generate excitement at the mall.

An advertisement in today’s Tribune states most items in the store are 70 percent off the lowest ticketed price.

The closing of the store will leave a large vacancy at the Northbridge Mall and will be the second retail clothing store to announce it is closing in the last six months. Juniors specialty retailer Vanity also closed its doors Sept. 29.

Northbridge Mall property manager Barb Fate was out of the office for the week and could not be reached for comment.