Nordstrom’s $6.25 billion deal to go private is paying off—and don’t expect an IPO anytime soon

When Nordstrom went private last year, the move was seen by industry analysts as a way to let the founding family make the changes needed to rejuvenate its sagging department store business without being hemmed in by Wall Street’s short-term focus on profits.

Nearly a year later, co-CEOs Peter and Erik Nordstrom, great grandsons of the retailer’s founder, say they don’t miss the distraction of being a public company. Indeed they hint that Nordstrom won’t return to the stock market anytime soon—if at all.

As reported by Fortune last week, Nordstrom’s revenue rose 7% in 2025 to $15.9 billion, slipping past a high watermark from 2019 and finally recovering from the hit to sales from the COVID pandemic and turmoil in the luxury market.

How going private gave Nordstrom freedom from Wall Street

While the chaos at Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus have given it a huge opening, Nordstrom has also helped its own cause by upgrading stores, spending a lot of money on merging databases, and expanding its inventory. All that costs money, and the shareholder focus on profits and margins would probably have hurt Nordstrom shares if it were still a public company. Wall Street generally sees department stores as a mature business, and will let........

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