Baltimore-area Party City store leases are headed to auction next month as the troubled, 40-year-old retailer shuts down.

The Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey-based party supply chain filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Dec. 21 in Texas with plans to close all its nearly 700 U.S. stores. The chain blamed inflationary pressures on costs and consumer spending and said the sales environment has become “immensely challenging.”

Leases to be auctioned early next month, after going-out-of-business sales, will include all 20 Party City stores in Maryland, a real estate advisor to the company said Friday. Baltimore-area stores include locations in Annapolis, Towson, Catonsville, East Point, Bel Air, Cockeysville, Columbia, Owings Mills, Pasadena and Westminster.

Party City said in its bankruptcy announcement that it decided to close “following exhaustive efforts by the company to find a path forward. … As with many other retailers, macroeconomic headwinds more recently proved too severe for the company to overcome.”

The closures follow Party City’s 2023 restructuring to eliminate nearly $1 billion in debt.

The exit will contribute to vacancies cropping up throughout urban and suburban retail markets. Other brick-and-mortar retailers that announced going out-of-business plans last year included Big Lots, BuyBuy Baby and apparel chain Rue21. Brands such as Advance Auto Parts, CVS and Denny’s closed hundreds of stores.

Other Maryland Party City stores with leases going to auction include locations in Forestville, Frederick, Gaithersburg, Hagerstown, Lanham, Laurel, Rockville, Salisbury, Waldorf and Wheaton.

Party City had grown into the largest party goods retailer in the U.S.

A&G Real Estate Partners said Friday it expects soon-to-be-vacant stores, ranging from 7,000 to 46,000 square feet, to attract interest from dollar stores, furniture stores, local specialty shops, gyms and entertainment tenants and medical office clinics. Some stores are freestanding while others are located in shopping centers or on city streets.

The chain’s portfolio, with many stores in high-traffic shopping centers, offers “an extraordinary opportunity” for expanding tenants “in what marks the end of an era in the retail industry,” Emilio Amendola, co-president of the New York-based real estate firm, said in the announcement Friday.

Party City said it’s keeping most of its 12,000 employees for “some time” to help with the shutdown. The retailer has notified officials with the Maryland Department of Labor so far that it will lay off 62 workers by the end of February at stores in Gaithersburg, Lanham and Rockville.

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