Struggling department store chain House of Fraser has called in KPMG to look at a possible company voluntary arrangement.
It wrote to landlords in January, asking for rent cuts of up to as much as 30% and last month got a £30m rescue cash injection from its Chinese owner Sanpower.
HoF, which has 59 operating stores across the UK with around 7.7m sq ft of floorspace, is already working on a plan to slash its footprint by 30%.
However, the continuing malaise on the high street has caused it to call in KPMG to accelerate its restructuring.
If the chain, which is carrying hundreds of millions of pounds of debt, does launch a CVA it would be the latest in a growing list of retail restructurings, following New Look, Carpetright and Toys R Us.
The continuing struggles on the high street were cited yesterday as one of the prime reasons for Hammerson’s about-turn on its recommendation to shareholders to back its takeover of rival shopping centre giant intu. According to data from EG’s Radius Data Exchange, intu is one of HoF’s biggest landlords, with around 500,000 sq ft of space.
Rival department store chain Debenhams this morning said it was also suffering from a poor trading environment, warning that profits would be at the lower end of expectations.
It is focusing on its Debenhams Redesigned strategy, which will see it right-sizing its oversized portfolio.
Even John Lewis, the darling of the British high street, has been suffering and reported profit before tax and exceptional items down by almost 22% for the year ended 27 January 2018.
SEE ALSO:
Inside the reimagined department store
Radius Data Exchange: the future of real estate data
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