UK’s Next to acquire collapsed Made.com furniture retailer, over 400 jobs are at risk

Next Plc is buying the Made.com furniture, and home accessories retailer brand for £3.4 million or about $3.8 million after the latter fell into administration with more than 400 employees losing their jobs.

As Made.com caved in and reduced to insolvency, Next Plc made the decision to acquire the company. However, the deal will not be able to save jobs, and no employee is going to be retained as the fashion retailer purchases parts of the shattered online furniture business.

The acquisition is gainful for Next as it will only be paying £3.4m for the deal. This is because the amount is more than a hundred times lower compared to Made.com’s value last year, which is £775 million. Apparently, its value plummeted big-time after running out of cash amid the slower economy in the United Kingdom, which dissuaded shoppers from buying new furniture.

As per Reuters, Next clothing company purchased Made.com’s brand, website, and intellectual property (IP) from PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) administrators. PwC, which is the second-largest professional services network in the world, confirmed in a statement that the acquisition deal did not include the employees, so more than 400 jobs are to be let go.

Before the company collapsed, it was reported that Made.com was actually doing well at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, as many people were spending freely on home improvements and renovations since they were stuck at home.

But it experienced issues along the way, and its cash had run out, which could be partly blamed on the supply chain disruptions which severely affected its operations. The economic downturn in the U.K. further sent Made.com spiraling down and finally reaching the point when it had to go into administration, ending its 18-month run as a public firm.

Meanwhile, because of the situation, there are still a lot of orders that were not delivered to customers yet. Shoppers were informed that some orders may no longer be completed.

"Close to 4500 customer orders in the UK and Europe which are already with carriers are being delivered. However, a large proportion of customer orders are still at origin in the Far East at various stages of production,” Sky News quoted the administrators at PwC as saying regarding the outstanding orders. "Due to the impact of the business entering administration, these items cannot be completed and shipped to customers."