Hard blow for the André shoe brand. The Nanterre commercial court has placed the company 1Monde9, which has owned the historic brand since 2020, in receivership, AFP learned on Wednesday, confirming information from the online economic media L’Informé.
The company 1Monde9 declared the cessation of its payments on January 27 and requested the opening of receivership proceedings, which was done on February 2, according to the court judgment that AFP consulted on Wednesday. A hearing on March 30 will decide “if necessary on the continuation of activity”.
Based in Puteaux (Hauts-de-Seine), 1Monde9 employs, according to the document consulted by AFP, 280 employees and claims an annual turnover excluding taxes of just under 31 million euros.
Cessation of payments at the end of January
Employed at André in 1992 and dismissed in 2021, Tania Rome, former FO central delegate, judges that this receivership is due to “malfunctioning, bad decisions and a bit of the Covid”. “We were immediately put on partial unemployment” when François Feijoo took over the company, said the former employee, indicating that she was one of the 17 staff representatives to have sued 1monde9 for “wrongful dismissal”.
The brand, bought by the online sales site Spartoo in 2018, had already been placed in receivership in April 2020 after having to file for bankruptcy. It was finally able to continue its activity thanks to a takeover offer, validated by the Grenoble commercial court in the summer of 2020. It planned to keep only 55 stores (out of 180 points of sale then) and 13 affiliates and involved the dismissal of just under 200 people.
In recent weeks, several major brands have found themselves in turmoil, including Camaïeu, Kookaï and Go Sport, but also Pimkie and Cop. Friend. With, sometimes, liquidations in the key, as is the case for André, a sign yet more than a century old.