ICSM Insolvency retailing news: all Wilko shops to close leaving the suppliers high and dry and thousands out of work
By Harry Mottram: It is the worst possible news for the suppliers and workers of retail giant Wilko – all the shops are to shut and all the staff will be made redundant following the collapse of the Canadian businessman Doug Putman’s deal to take on 300 of the stores. B&M will still be buying 50 of the shops but they will be rebranded and the current Wilko staff let go - although it is possible some will be rehired, while The Pound Shop is set to buy some stores as well - and The Range have bought the brand name.
Apart from the staff the biggest losers are the hundreds of businesses who supply Wilko with a vast array of household and garden goods and who will be unlikely to get paid for hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of goods. Secured creditors such as lenders and the taxman may receive something via the administrators PwC who have been in charge of Wilko since its collapse in August. However, with the firm in debt to the tune of £37 million according to media reports it seems unlikely much will be rescued from the ashes. What has been pointed out by critics is the firm paid a dividend of £3 million pounds to its owners last year when the firm was already in trouble.
Ian Carrotte of ICSM said the whole sorry affair painted a picture of incompetence and greed while the workers and the Wilkinson family owners ‘had not covered themselves in glory.’ He said: “B&M have clearly gone through the portfolio and are taking on 50 stores for a reported £13 million pounds where they don’t have coverage or have potential – which is good business. At ICSM our main concern is for the suppliers, the contractors and the sole traders – the businesses that make the UK economy tick over. A large debt can send a business under so Wilko’s demise is a double or triple tragedy for all concerned and another hammer blow to the high street.”
In a new development this week and in light of the Wilko affair the John Lewis chairman Sharon White has called for a royal commission to review Britain’s struggling high streets. She said: “Too many towns and cities are shells of their former selves. Boarded-up shops left vacant, dwindling numbers of banks and post offices. And in their place seemingly endless rows of vaping and charity shops.”
Ian Carrotte said he supported the move to arrest the decline. He said: “Councils hammer the high street with business rates and expensive car parks, restrictions to motorists while retailers have moved to out-of-town shopping centres that don’t have the same issues. The covid lockdowns damaged non-essential retailers and the hiking of duties on alcohol has seen pubs in town centres struggle to survive. There’s the issue of security, shop lifting, falling police numbers and the proliferation of stealing from shops – shop lifting is too soft a word for it. We need a comprehensive policy to bring the public back to the high streets and make them the centre of life again.”
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ICSM, The Exchange, Express Park, Bristol Road, Bridgwater, Somerset TA6 4RR. Tel: 0844 854 1850. www.icsmcredit.com. Ian.carrotte@icsmcredit.com
