According to Credit Action, the debtors’ charity, people go bankrupt at the rate of one every 3.69 minutes. A property is repossessed in the UK every 11.4 minutes. Spare a thought for the hard-worked staff of the Citizens Advice Bureau who handle an estimated 9.500 new debt problems every day. A staggering 16,348 individual bankruptcy petitions were made in the first three months of this year, along with 2,177 company winding-up petitions due to financial difficulty.

Source: The Independent

Video game makers Realtime Worlds have confirmed they have gone into administration. The company, founded by the creator of Lemmings and Grand Theft Auto, was viewed as one of the biggest players in the UK computer games market.

They were behind the 2007 double-BAFTA winning hit ‘Crackdown’ and APB, which has recently been released.

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Total losses = 185

Online wedding and celebrations supplies business Confetti has gone into administration. The Manchester-based firm, founded in 1999, has lost 48 of its 94 staff and closed its five high-street shops in Glasgow, Leeds, Birmingham, Reading and London.

Source: The Press Association

Total losses = 48

Almost 2000 jobs will be lost at chains such as Threshers and Wine Rack, it emerged today, as the administrators to their collapsed owner First Quench said it would close hundreds of stores as part of the adminstration.

First Quench, which also owns Bottoms Up, Haddows, a Scottish chain, and The Local, went into administration on October 29, after being hit by cut-price supermarket competition.

KPMG, the adminstrators to First Quench, said today that 381 stores will close across the brands, which will result in 1908 redundancies in those stores that are closing and 34 at the head office in Welwyn Garden City.

The latest store closures are in addition to the 373 shops KPMG said earlier this month would be closing, with the loss of 1738 jobs. The administrators had previously announced 81 job cuts at the firm’s head office.

Source: Times Online

Total losses = 1908

Sandcity who own O’Neill have gone into administration with a potential loss of 90+ staff at the 11 stores around the country. Administrators KPMG have been brought in and they are going to try and find a buyer for the ailing company.   Sandcity is actually owned by the clothing company Black Leisure.

Blacks decided there was “no reasonable prospect” of restoring loss-making Sandcity – the subsidiary which owns the stores – to profit.

Potential job loss = 90

Lingerie maker Intimas has brought in the administrators after a long spell of poor trading in the Economic Downturn. The Derbyshire-based business has called in PricewaterhouseCoopers to sell the company as a going concern and protect its 200-odd employees’ positions. The administrators are to review the business and the sale options for Intimas and its main brands. Intimas reported £1.65m of losses in the first half of 2008, due to declining sales.

Intimas specialises in designing women’s lingerie and swimwear. It also manufactures brand goods for labels including Ted Baker, Lepel and Charnos, as well as collections for retailers on the high street.  Intimas signed a three-year contract to make products for Caprice Lingerie, in 2006.

Stuart Maddison, joint administrator at PricewaterhouseCoopers, believes that the sale will attract plenty of interest.

Source: Hanna Lahabib at Business Sales Report

Mica is a voluntary trading group, which allows its members, independent hardware shops, to compete with larger rivals such as B&Q. The group is owned by the independent hardware store operators, according to the company’s website. The group has over 160 member stores in the UK. The retailers also purchase their stocks through Mica.

Leonard Curtis has been appointed as administrators to the group, and has taken over the warehouse and stock.

The business is to continue to trade under the name of Mica DIY. A long-term supplier to the hardware business Stax Trade Centres is to take over the Vault as Mica’s wholesaler.

Source: Rob Moore

Three main subsidiaries of coffee chain Coffee Republic, Coffee Republic Franchising and Goodbean have been placed into administration after suffering from decreasing consumer spending.

Richard Hill and David Crawshaw of KPMG have been hired as joint administrators. Mr Hill has received a substantial amount of interest, partly from well-known companies. The administrators aim to sell the businesses as going concerns as quickly as possible. Underperforming stores will be shut down and redundancies will be made.

It was only in December that the company announced it had cleared its bank debts of £3.3 million, and was expecting to become cash flow positive by April 2009.  Trading in the UK had apparently become stable, though it would be more cautious with its expansion plans.  The cafe chain had 184 stores in Britain at the end of last year, 114 of which were concessions, 51 were franchises and the company ran 19.

Coffee Republic was established by brother and sister team Bobby and Sahar Hashemi in 1995. The company failed in its attempt to keep up with now larger competitors such as Starbucks and Costas. Its overly ambitious expansion meant that it has struggled to reach profitability.

The holding company Coffee Republic plc has not been taken into administration.
Source: By Caroline Clayfield

• Vanmaker LDV has been placed into administration with 850 jobs possibly being lost. Attempts to sell Birmingham-based LDV as a going concern have failed.
• CragRats theatre and training company goes into adminstration. More than 70 people are believed to have lost their jobs after an award-winning theatre and training company hit financial trouble.
• Sufolk Marine survey company goes bust with a major operation in Lowestoft has gone into administration resulting in 27 local redundancies – and the propsect of more to come.
• Venture Packaging Innovations goes into administration. The company supplies packaging for cosmetics, healthcare, lifestyle and entertainment industries and has been going for 20 years. It specializes in multi-colour printed cartons, bespoke packaging in card, specialist packaging or ‘unusual folding items’. The reasons for the company’s decline into administration are still unknown.
• The Portland Spa Hotel and Conference Centre has been seriously hit by the recession and has called in the administrators.
• Harvey World Travel has gone into administration and sold almost half its branches to newly-created company Vacation World.
• The Staincliffe Hotel in Seaton Carew, near Hartlepool, is looking for a new owner after chef Mark Jones was forced to place the business into administration.
  
• Deloitte has been lined up to potentially provide administrators to satellite sports business Setanta. The broadcaster is believed to be struggling to pay off it bills for the rights to Premiership games and for the Scottish Premier League.
• Rock board places the company in administration as the slump in the property market claims another high-profile victim. Rock, the property company founded by Paul Kemsley is one of Sir Alan Sugar’s closest advisers.
• Challenge Finance collapses after suspected client fraud.
• Paterson Printing in administration with 40 staff axed.

Bay Trading confirmed today that 1230 employees would lose their jobs while 566 jobs would be saved after a company called the Rinku Group bought the remaining 130 shops. Last month Bay Trading went into administration and the 1800 staff members at 260 branches though it was all over.

Job losses = 1230

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• Rinku Group buys Bay Trading
• Rinku Group