Wait. Palm Had Retail Stores?

Palm shareholders gave the company a kick in the Grape Nuts this morning in answer to news that it will shutter all but one of its retail stores by the end of the first quarter. The closure affects some 33 Palm locations nationwide, including airport kiosks. The only store Palm plans to keep open is the one in its Silicon Valley headquarters (which to the company’s credit is one more than Gateway kept open when it pioneered this particular brick-and-mortar exit strategy).

For Palm, which could likely use all the cash it can scrape together, the move seems wise. “It makes sense,” Global Crown Capital analyst Pablo Perez-Fernandez told the San Jose Mercury News. “They need to take every resource they have and focus them on their core product that will take them on a growth path.”

Assuming there’s a growth path to be found. And for Palm, which recently sacked a reported 10% of its workforce and just settled a class-action suit over defects in some of its Treo handhelds, that’s not exactly a certainty at this time. “They’re toast,” said Shareholder Value Management analyst Jeff Embersits.