Quiz appoints KPMG for restructuring
Fashion retailer Quiz has tapped KPMG administrators to restructure its store portfolio. The news will see the brand’s Kast Retail subsidiary shed around 90 jobs, while allowing for the renegotiation of rent on its 82 standalone stores in the UK and Ireland.
Many retailers were already facing woeful trading levels before the Covid-19 lock-down, with stagnant wages in the UK and the rising cost of living essentially crippling consumer spending power over the last decade. As a result, the last three years in particular had seen a spike in collapses of high street traders, long before their sales figures were driven further down by the coronavirus.
As the Government rolls back its jobs preservation scheme, and finances which had essentially kept such firms afloat for the first half of 2020, a landslide of retailers are suddenly having to appoint administrators. The latest of these is Quiz, a British clothing business founded in 1993 in Scotland.
As of 2017, it had more than 275 shops in the United Kingdom and more than fifty shops in other parts of Europe and Asia. When it was floated on the London Stock Exchange that year, it was valued at £245 million – but its fortunes have swiftly declined since.
The fast fashion retailer has appointed administrators from KPMG to help it restructure its broader portfolio – in particular, its wholly owned subsidiary Kast Retail – in a bid to stabilise its fortunes. Kast has 82 standalone stores in the UK, and Republic of Ireland, but as a result of this news, 93 of the 915 current staff of the Kast subsidiary will be made redundant.
Quiz chief executive Tarak Ramzan said, “It is with deep sadness and regret for some of our colleagues and partners that we had to take this decision to restructure the group’s operations… Physical retail in the UK was facing a major structural challenge prior to the outbreak of Covid-19 with the economics of operating stores on traditional leases becoming increasingly difficult… The significant economic uncertainty we now face as consumers and businesses emerge from the Covid-19 pandemic has meant that, in order to ensure a sustainable future for the group, we have taken this decision to place the subsidiary which operates our stores into administration.”
The coming reshuffle, which will allow Quiz to renegotiate its rents with its remaining Kast presences, looks set to see Zandra Retail, another wholly owned subsidiary of Quiz, acquiring the business assets of Kast after the appointment of administrators. The acquisition of Kast via administrators is expected to take place for “a cash consideration of £1.3 million.”
