Oddbins seeking rescue investment

Embattled UK off-licence chain Oddbins is hoping for financial aid from within the wine trade as it seeks to drag itself back from the brink.

The loss-making chain is currently taking advice from restructuring experts Spectrum Corporate Finance and Deloitte as it prepares a shake-up that is expected to involve store closures and job-losses across the group.

It is believed that managing director Simon Baile is on the hunt for an investor with an in-depth understanding of the wine trade in an effort to establish a point of difference between his stores and the supermarkets which are accountable for 70% of UK wine sales.

Fears over the future of Oddbins have been circulating in the industry for a few weeks now, with the failure of First Quench Retailing and the painful financial fall-out for many in the trade still fresh in the memory.

Since Baile led a buy-out of the struggling chain two years ago he has managed to halve operating losses from £8.3 million to £4.6m in 2009.

Despite a promising start to 2010, when like-for-like sales were up 5%, a disappointing Christmas period has led Baile to urgently reassess the business in order to decide the best way forward.

It is expected that a proportion of the group’s 127 stores will be closed as a result of the evaluation, while the company is understood to require more working capital after an ongoing legal dispute with Castel added to the burden of weak sales.

It has also been reported that Oddbins owes several wine and spirit companies “hundreds of thousands of pounds”.

Alan Lodge, 07.03.2011