Children's clothing retailer Gymboree files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection

Children’s clothing retailer Gymboree Group Inc. announced late Wednesday that it has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and it will close around 800 Gymboree and Crazy 8 stores in the United States and Canada.

The San Francisco-based company also said in a press release it is pursuing sales of its high-end children’s fashion line Janie and Jack, of which it operates 139 stores nationwide, as well as the online platform for Gymboree and its intellectual property.

The company said its Gymboree, Crazy 8, Janie and Jack stores and online platforms remain open at this time and will continue to serve customers.Gymboree Play & Music, which provides play, music and art classes for parents and newborn children and kids up to 5 years old, split from Gymboree Group Inc. in 2016 and those locations will not be affected by the Gymboree Group Inc.’s bankruptcy filing and store closures.

However, for customers with Gymboree gift cards, time is running out to use them.

The company said it has “sought authorization from the Court to continue to honor customer gift cards for 30 days.” The chain’s popular GymBucks and Gymboree Rewards programs have been discontinued “effective immediately,” according to the release.

Last month, Gymboree announced it had begun a "comprehensive review of strategic options," the end result of which could be a sale "at the brand level," the company said.

This is Gymboree’s second bankruptcy filing in the last two years as the company first filed in the summer of 2017, leading to the closure of about 350 of its 1,281 locations — most of them Gymboree stores.

Gymboree was founded in the 1970s as a company that offered classes for toddlers and parents in Northern California. It would go on to making children’s clothing and launch a chain of stores in the 1980s.

Contributing: Justin L. Mack, Indianapolis Star, and Kelly Tyko, USA TODAY