- Tuesday, 24 November 2009
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The email of the species is more macho than the femail (Inq Bad Language)
Woolworths' days are numbered
WE ALL KNEW WOOLWORTHS was struggling a little over the past few years as it hired a dog and a sheep to carry out its ad campaign – today the company’s struggles come to a head.
As Woolworths scrambles to sell off its DVD publishing arm for £100m to BBC Worldwide, and its retail business to super-business-saver Hilco for a whopping £1, the company shares are suspended.
At present Woolworths owns 40 percent of the DVD publisher, 2entertain which has brought us such gems as Dr Who and Blue Planet – the other 60 percent is owned by BBC Worldwide.
This sale should bring the company around £100m and, although some are saying this is vital to bring it out of administration, it is a drop in the ocean compared to the £385m debt it is in.
Woolworths’ directors have been in talks with restructuring specialist, Hilco way into the early hours of this morning and again today to try and strike a deal which will sign over the 840-store retail business and to get rid of some of that ever-rising debt.
This would leave the company with a profitable wholesale distribution operation and allow it to remain in public ownership.
Although this all sounds hunky dory, both deals depend on the approval of the company’s money lenders – the Bank of Ireland subsidiary Burdale Financial and GMAC Commercial.
If the lenders give a thumbs down the company will be forced into administration to avoid breaking the law by selling products while insolvent.
Although this probably wont make Woolworths feel any better, it is not alone in this process, as good old MFI faces a dark future if problems aren’t resolved in a matter of days. µ
L'Inq
MediaWeek
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The dog and sheep ad was awesome.
Recession is an excellent way of weeding out the underperformers, both Woolworths and MFI are prime examples of sloppy store design and an obvious lack of polish. 

Aside from the job losses I don't think anybody will be sad to see either store go.
I'd expected this type of Woolly Mammoth be extinct by now; Eau de Sugar pinch-’n’-minx; Is there no bailout's your uncle for Ladybird Chic on the High Street? Haberdasher crumbs! Institutionalised bric-a-brac, higgedly-piggeldy, mishmash as you do. Marks my word, these Sosmally pirates, Warriors in Woolworths, are a din of forty thieves at Aladdin's Cave. Is it Worth-It to wool it? What it used to be: Woolworths is a far greener alternative - a one-stop shop - which alas, may as well be named Browns. PLCstretchers and PLClands at No. 10 and Old No. 7. Desperate Johnnie Walkers call for separate Johnnie Walkers. Measure for measure, you can still cop most of the kit at the Despot if you're willing to gambol.
Shame, but as the earlier post mentioned, these should have changed with the times but didnt, and the biggest nail in MFI`s chip board coffin was when they stopped selling stuff you could take away..... since trumped by the likes of Ikea and Argos.
hey its the way to make up for crappy business model or inethicial competitors
get to DC and get ya half a billion in inflationary dollars and issue a 100 million pention check to the CEO/COO.. I have a feeling they wont be in a private jet
Adam, although you may think nobody will miss Wollies, the problem it will create on top of the job losses, are hundreds of vacant shops littering highstreets up and down the country. OK some will get picked up by large chains but others could remain closed for years or worse turned into pound shops that many of these highstreets already have.
What on earth are you going on about?
I just thought I'd point out that here in Oz we have Woolworths. It was originally a straight take from the Woolworths stores in the rest of the world. Apparently many years ago some clever dick realised that F.W. Woolworth had failed to register the name in Aust. and registered it. Since then it has grown to be Australia's largest and most successful retailer.
Just a bit of useless background for anyone interested.
I agree with Darren's comment. In the US after Woolworth's closed in 1997, many locations sat empty for extended periods and became eyesores on the local landscape. Stores that were in malls were quickly subdivided and converted to other businesses, but on the US Main Street, many of the locations were no longer viable for today's retailers. While over time some of these vacant spaces filled in with trashy shops like Family Dollar and Dollar General, there are just as many that still sit vacant. In one case where I live, a Woolworth's that closed in 1992 STILL sits empty in the middle of a busy street with restaurants on all sides, in another case a Woolworths that closed in 1994 sat empty until the beginning of this year when the city finally stepped in and exercised emminent domain.