The Food Lion grocery store in Oakwood is closing on or before Feb. 19, corporate spokeswoman Christy Phillips-Brown said this morning.

The store at 3640 Mundy Mill Road is one of 15 stores nationwide that failed “to meet sales expectations,” she said.

The Oakwood store is the only Georgia location that Food Lion’s parent company, Delhaize Group, plans to close this year. The other stores are in Tennessee, Virginia, Maryland, Kentucky, South Carolina and Florida, Phillips-Brown said.

Food Lion has two other stores in Hall, both in Gainesville.

“The associates at the (Oakwood) store can apply for any open positions in our company,” Phillips-Brown.

She didn’t know the exact number of employees at the store but said the average Food Lion store has 35 to 45 employees. She also didn’t know when the store was opened.

The Food Lion store has been a longtime staple in Oakwood. About 10 years ago, the 30,000-square-foot store added 16,000 square feet.

But competition has increased in recent years, with the opening of the Publix grocery store off Winder Highway and Atlanta Highway, a Kroger grocery store on Winder Highway at Sloan Mill Road, and a Walmart Supercenter and Sam’s Club on Mundy Mill across from Gainesville State College.

Also, many businesses complained that a $75 million Georgia Department of Transportation project in the area cut into their profits.

The project, which included construction of a interchange at nearby Atlanta Highway and widening Mundy Mill Road, ended late last year.