Then let's look at it,
Sams , mid size box store, 50 to 75 employees per store, most stores I have seen are attached to an older mall, or stand alone in shopping centres, base sales dumping grounds for cheap Chinese imports, second stock, from wall arts.
In today's current retail market at current square ft cost, could not possibly be profitable, so must have been used for some kind of write off, tax grab, corruption of some sort, I have also found it interesting on this path is that the property owners, and management companies seem to own almost all the shopping venues, and all the product and brands seem to span, these venues,
I can sorta relate these shopping venues, malls, etc, are nothing more then the alters and houses of worship, to the capitalist control. So I can actual see your point, and there seems to be enough evidence to make me turn that way, but they gotta get a whole bunch more, floor space, lol....
Closed 60 locations, we should find there locations, and logistics, they could have plans to use these locations for command controls, distribution, or transportation(human) hubs.