Australian fashion chains Marcs and David Lawrence have entered voluntary administration.
The high street chains, which are owned by Sydney-based M Webster Holdings Pty Ltd and Webster Asset Pty Ltd, collectively operate 52 freestanding stores, 11 outlet shops and 140 concessions in Australia and New Zealand.
Together the two companies employ 1,130 people who have been paid up until Jan. 30, according to administrator Rodgers Reidy.
“We intend to review the operations of the businesses and continue to trade while we market the businesses for sale,” Rodgers Reidy director Geoffrey Reidy said Thursday.
Deteriorating sales, general market conditions and poor cashflow were cited as contributing factors.
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A Rodgers Reidy spokesman declined to confirm the total debt burden or comment on a report in The Australian Financial Review that the companies owe debts of close to 30 million Australian dollars or $23 million.
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Founded in 1978, David Lawrence sells women’s wear only, while Marcs, established 1979, sells both women’s wear and men’s wear.
The chains join a long line of post GFC Australian fashion retail casualties and brand closures, including Lisa Ho, Pumpkin Patch, Payless Shoes, Bettina Liano, Collette Dinnigan and Easton Pearson.
The administration announcement came two days after Hennes & Mauritz published its full year report, detailing 1,999 Swedish krona or $220 million in sales across its 22 Australian boutiques in the twelve months to November, up 78 percent on 2015 in Australian currency terms.
The new H&M figures bring the combined 2016 Australian sales tally for H&M, Zara and Uniqlo to approximately 700 million Australian dollars or $520.3 million at average exchange for the year. That’s roughly four percent of the Australian clothing market, which IbisWorld estimates is worth 19 billion Australian dollars or $14.4billion per annum, growing at 3.9 percent annually over the five years through 2016/2017.
Zara, the first of the three international retailers to enter the Australian market in 2011, saw Australian sales of 221.9 million Australian dollars or $165 million for the twelve months to January, up 24 percent. Fast Retailing’s Uniqlo said it saw sales of 174.5 million Australian dollars or $128 million for the twelve months to August, up 47 percent.