The textile manufacturer last filed for bankruptcy in 2019.
(Photo: imago images / Steinach)
Munich Four years after bankruptcy, the women’s fashion group Gerry Weber is once again facing far-reaching restructuring. For the listed group holding company, the board of directors wants to initiate a pre-insolvency restructuring procedure on Wednesday, with which the debt burden is to be significantly reduced and fresh capital is to be raised, as Gerry Weber announced in Halle in Westphalia. The board of directors takes the company from the stock exchange, the financial investors Robus, Whitebox and JPMorgan, who only joined in 2019, lose their money as well as the small shareholders.
For the branch network bundled in the subsidiary Gerry Weber Retail in Germany, the Management Board reports insolvency to the District Court of Bielefeld. Branch closures are imminent in the next three months.
The renovation project is “a necessary reaction to the external circumstances,” said CEO Angelika Schindler-Obenhaus. These included the store closures during the pandemic and changing customer behavior. Retail needs to be realigned. Schindler-Obenhaus said that Gerry Weber wanted to “build the branch network of the future”, but at the same time “put every square meter of space to the test.” The company had to concentrate on the healthy core, strengthen wholesale and international business. Christian Gerloff becomes the insolvency administrator for Gerry Weber’s branches.
Gerry Weber: As with Leoni, the shareholders are losing their money
Gerry Weber explained that negotiations with the main creditors were ongoing. The aim is to secure the financing until 2026. For the holding, Gerry Weber uses the StaRUG procedure introduced in Germany two years ago, with which companies can be relieved of debt outside of insolvency. Most recently, the automotive supplier Leoni was one of the first and largest companies to use the StaRUG. Shareholders lose their money there too.
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Gerry Weber employs 2100 people worldwide. In 2019, the company – at that time with a workforce of 3,600 employees – filed for bankruptcy after years of rapid expansion of the branch network and the takeover of the women’s fashion chain Hallhuber. At that time, the creditors around Robus (39.5 percent) and Whitebox (38.5 percent) had become owners.
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