All of Ted Baker’s UK stores to close
Ted Baker is set to close all of its UK stores within the next three weeks under its restructuring plans.
The retailer’s UK arm, No Ordinary Designer Label (NODL), appointed administrators in March, and has since closed 15 stores.
Prior to its collapse, Ted Baker operated 46 stores in the UK.
US company Authentic Brands Group (ABG), which owns Ted Baker’s intellectual property, has been searching for a new partner to operate the brand’s retail and online UK business. Next and Frasers Group have previously emerged as potential candidates, however The Sun has reported that the latter has pulled out.
Since Ted Baker’s founder, Ray Kelvin, left the company in 2019 amid claims of inappropriate behaviour, it has issued a number of profit warnings and went into the COVID-19 pandemic from a difficult financial position
The retailer was de-listed from the London Stock Exchange in 2022 after it was bought by ABG for about £210m. A subsequent brand licensing partnership with Dutch company AARC was also recently abandoned.
Last year, a restructuring process saw the retailer let go of around 200 members of its head office staff.
It then secured a long-term lending facility from asset-based lender Secure Trust Commercial Finance. It was hoped that the facility would have provided a “platform for growth” for Ted Baker.