The latest twist the demise of Wilko, is news that the man who resurrected HMV wants to do the same for the collapsed High Street DIY store.
Canadian tycoon Doug Putman is making a last-ditch bid to save some of Wilko’s 400 stores and 12,000 jobs.
Will he get anywhere?
“Still not at all clear whether he will get anywhere, “ says Oliver Shah, associate editor of the Sunday Times, on X.
The word is that the administrators of PwC prefer a liquidation after attempts to find new owners collapsed this week.
This weekend, administrators will pore over the last-minute Putman bid.
Workers at Wilko are on the edge
Long-suffering workers at Wilko have lived on the edge for weeks amid rumours of new buyers and liquidation.
Meanwhile, the crowds flock to the administration sales at the stores. The prospect of cheap hardware spurs-on many; as goods are at lower prices.
“Nothing has been confirmed. We have been instructed to keep trading as usual until we hear otherwise, “ the man on the till at Wilko snapped when I inquired.
It is not the despair it is the hope
For many Wilko workers, these tense weeks must have evoked the famous line from a film: ”It’s not the despair I can’t take – it is the hope!”
Yet hope springs eternal. Putman – the reviver of HMV – seems to have bucketloads of it right now.
Small town boy
Putman, aged 39, is a born maverick entrepreneur. He dropped out of business school and went to work in the family toy store in his home town of Ancaster, Ontario – population 40,000.
Yet, he struck out on his own to set up a successful music chain – Sunrise Records.
When Putman bought HMV in 2019, for just $883,000, it was pretty much dead and buried.
Sales of CDs and DVDs had plummeted. The business went into administration twice.
Merchandise is the key
Putman’s strategy of pushing merchandise with the music turned the business into a profit, in 2022, on the back of a 66.8% surge in revenue.
Ed Sheeran played in HMV stores to help bring back the crowds and the rest is history.
It is still only an outside chance that Putman will save Wilko – or about half of the business as analysts believe – but, if he does, he is likely to do so in dramatic fashion.
