Calvetron brands wound down leading to loss of 600 jobs

Concession brands Jacques Vert, Precis and Windsmoor have been wound down by administrators Duff & Phelps leading to the loss of 600 jobs.

The brands formed part of the former Calvetron Brands group, which fell into administration in May leading to an initial loss of 400 jobs. However, having failed to find a buyer, the administrator has been left with no choice but to close the businesses.

Benjamin Wiles of Duff & Phelps said trying to secure a sale given the torrid conditions on the high street – and in particular given the pressures on department stores such as House of Fraser (which is set to close more than half of its stores) and Debenhams where the brands were stocked – proved to be too challenging.

“Calvetron Brands has faced the perfect storm of extremely difficult trading conditions on the high street, rising costs and low customer confidence all of which hindered our ability to secure a buyer.

“We have explored a number of potential options, however no viable offers for the business as a going concern have been received. As such we are now having to close the remaining concessions here in the UK and Ireland as well as Canada and move to trade-out the stock," Wiles said.

The move means a loss of 500 redundancies in retail in the UK, along with 90 head office job losses in London and Birmingham. A further 250 jobs will be lost in Canada. A skeleton staff will be retained for the time being to help shift the remaining stock.

Calvetron, which was headed by investors Sandeep Vyas and Haseeb Aziz, acquired the brands from the former Style Group Brands, which had gone into administration itself just last year. The businesses were initially founded in 1972 by Jack Cynamon and Alan Green, two tailors from the East End of London. They later used a French version of their names to create the Jacques Vert brand.