West Bromwich's Crawshaw butchers shop escapes the chop
A fresh meat factory outlet in West Bromwich has escaped the chop in a round of closures at butchers chain Crawshaw Group.
The business, which has shops in the North and Midlands, has closed 35 stores and a distribution centre, resulting in the loss of 354 jobs.
The announcement followed the appointment of administrators to the Rotherham-based group on Friday, after it failed to secure additional funding.
Administrators from EY said on Monday that they have entered into discussions with interested parties with a view to agreeing a sale of the business in the coming weeks.
A rescue deal could safeguard the remaining 261 Crawshaw staff including those at its West Bromwich Fresh Meat Factory Shop in Dudley Street, which only opened in 2016.
Just 19 stores remain open after 35 ceased to trade over the weekend, while a distribution centre in Astley has been closed. Another facility in Hellaby remains open.
The collapse of the company came after several years of financial losses.
According to its latest set of results for the six months to July 29, the group posted revenue of £21.6 million and a pre-tax loss of £1.7m.
Food mogul Ranjit Boparan holds a near 30% stake in the business and his 2 Sisters Food Group also supplies Crawshaw.
The "chicken king" – so-called because of 2 Sisters' large-scale involvement in the poultry trade – is also an adviser to the board.
Shares in the AIM-listed company were suspended last week as it issued a notice of its intention to appoint administrators.
Hunter Kelly and Charles King of EY’s restructuring team are joint administrators of Crawshaw Group.
Mr Kelly said: “Crawshaw has not been immune to the well documented issues on the high street, which has resulted in a number of stores becoming loss making. Despite the new management team’s best efforts, it was not possible to raise additional investment to restructure the business by reducing the number of high street stores and expanding its successful factory shop format and instore Spar butchery offering.
"As a result the Group would have run out of cash due to the loss making high street stores and therefore administration was necessary. Crawshaw’s out of town factory store format has proved to be successful and we are hopeful that a purchaser can be found who can take forward management’s plan for these profitable stores.
“We are continuing to trade 19 profitable stores and the Hellaby processing and distribution centre as normal and would encourage interested parties to come forward. Unfortunately it was necessary to immediately close 35 stores in mainly high street locations that were no longer viable, which resulted in 354 redundancies.”
