Missguided suppliers to get back very little of £30m owed

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Jul 29, 2022

Companies that supplied goods to Missguided before its administration filing and purchase by Frasers Group will get back less than 2% of the £30 million owed to them.

The money was owed by Missguided’s main trading entity before its collapse in May and the Guardian has reported that the suppliers will only get back 1.7p for every £1 due.

Missguided had long-term debts of over £80 million when it collapsed, higher than the £57 million it owed in 2021, according to the administrator’s report that has been sent to creditors and that has been seen by the newspaper.

As well as suppliers being owed £30 million, unsecured creditors in general are owed £46 million. That also includes money due to HMRC and employees.

Large sums are also owed to major players linked to the business. But Rajib passi, father of Missguided founder Nitin Passi, is unlikely to get back anything from the almost-£25 million he loaned to the group to support it in recent years. However, administrators Teneo said they’re mulling legal action to get repayment of a loan of almost £570,000 he took from the firm.

Turnaround specialist Alteri stepped in with rescue funding last year and is likely to get back at least £18 million, although it had pumped £58 million into the business.

Frasers bought Missguided’s intellectual property for £20 million after the collapse that was driven by the online boom from which it had benefited fading due to stores reopening.

The firm’s main trading entity had seen sales of over £282 million in 2021, but that fell to a little over £198 million in 2022. And its underlying losses grew.

But while Missguided’s rescue by Frasers sees the name live on (and Nitin Passi back running it), many suppliers are struggling. Shortly before the administration filing they were turning up at the company’s offices to try to get their money and a number of them were quoted saying that their own businesses were at risk due to their heavy dependence on orders from Missguided.