Canadian retailer Blacks Photography is to close its remaining 59 stores, a victim of the overwhelming shift to digital.

Blacks, which was bought in 2009 by telco Telus, said it could no longer imagine a profitable future despite a shift to its online business and the launch of a new gallery-style retail format last year.

“Despite the positive momentum that we’ve seen and the substantial financial improvements we’ve delivered, we haven’t been able to realise profitable growth,” Blacks GM and VP Lisa Richardson said in an interview with the Globe and Mail newspaper, published online.

“It’s a difficult day.”

Blacks, which has traded for 85 years, will close its stores on August 8.