What Happened to Linens 'n Things?

Linens ’n Things grew from a single home-goods store in the 1970s into a nationwide big-box chain selling linens, housewares, and small appliances. Known for large footprints, weekly coupons, and seasonal assortments, the retailer expanded aggressively through the 1990s after being spun off from Melville Corporation and listed publicly in 1996. It competed head-to-head with Bed Bath & Beyond and regional players, often colocating in power centers and mall-adjacent retail corridors.

By the mid-2000s the model faced mounting pressure: softer home categories after the housing peak, rising private-label competition, and the shift to online comparison shopping. With leveraged obligations and traffic declines, the company filed for Chapter 11 in 2008 and ultimately conducted going-out-of-business sales, closing its U.S. stores. The intellectual property—name, domain, and certain customer assets—was later acquired and used to relaunch Linens ’n Things as an online-only storefront, keeping the brand recognizable to coupon-savvy shoppers even as the physical chain disappeared.

Today, Linens ’n Things is remembered as a quintessential era of big-box home retail: towering towel walls, kitchen-gadget aisles, and circulars full of bargains—an analog shopping ritual that gave way to e-commerce and more flexible specialty formats.