160-180 New Academy Sports Stores Coming By 2028

Academy Sports & Outdoors has big plans to greatly grow the number of its stores over the next five years. The sporting goods chain aims to open between 160 to 180 new store locations across the country by 2028.

"As we move into 2025 and beyond, our goal will be to go into new markets, with a greater density of new store openings around the same time," said CEO Steve Lawrence. "The end result of all this work is that we believe we have an opportunity to open up even more stores than we initially modeled."

For now, the new stores will be split between new markets and areas where Academy already has a presence. But the long-term goal is even bigger.

"Longer term, Academy sees runway to have 800-plus stores nationwide," noted CFO Carl Ford during the company's earnings call. That would nearly triple its current 283-store count across 18 states.

Academy opened 14 new stores total in the 2023 fiscal year, five more than the prior year. This included openings in Austin, Texas; Tampa Bay, Florida; Christiansburg, Virginia; Indianapolis, Indiana; Springfield, Illinois; West Palm Beach, Florida and Harlingen, Texas.

Between 15 and 17 more new stores are expected to open this current fiscal year as Academy starts its major expansion.

"Academy Sports + Outdoors is excited to provide our customers with new convenient stores...to help our loyal customers get to the fun faster," said Eric Friederich, senior VP of retail operations.

Academy will carefully choose the opening dates for future new stores based on their experience. "We've learned that stores open in the first half of the year get out of the gate faster than stores open up in Q3 and Q4," Lawrence stated.

Founded in 1938 as a family business in Texas, Academy has grown into a one-stop shop for active families. Its large stores sell sports clothing, shoes, camping gear, hunting/fishing equipment and more top brands at low prices.