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The administrators of collapsed furniture retain chain Sleep City have announced the company’s 64 stores will be shut over the next six to eight weeks, just days after the company collapsed into administration. The closures will add to the growing number of retail locations that are set to close within the next two years, with major companies including Speciality Fashion, Luxottica and Billabong all announcing plans of their own to close down hundreds of shops. PWC partner...
Nicole Perrin, the wife of bankrupt entrepreneur Matthew Perrin, has emerged as the largest creditor of a company controlled by the former Billabong International chief executive.   Perrin's company Christie Pty Ltd was placed in receivership last week after Perrin filed for bankruptcy.   The company is being wound up a...
Dear Aunty B, I am thinking of starting an online business selling replica designer handbags and accessories. As long as I state that these are replicas and not the real thing, am I breaking any laws? Hopeful, Laburnum   Dear Hopeful, What are you thinki...
Global surfwear giant Billabong has beaten the likes of Coca-Cola Amatil and Lion Nathan in a new ranking of corporate Australia’s most valuable brands as a share of total enterprise value. With a brand worth just over $1.6 billion, 41% of the company’s value, Billabong works its brand harder than any other company in the nation, according to research by analyst and adviser firm Brand Finance.That puts it ahead of Coca-Cola in terms of brand worth...
One year ago, former Billabong chief and entrepreneur Matthew Perrin was valued at $150 million. All he has left is a $30,000 in cash, a $200 watch, $3000 worth of clothes, a Mercedes he can't drive, and a list of creditors a mile long. The extent of Perrin's fall from grace has been revealed in bankruptcy documents lodged early this week which list his assets and liabilities. Perrin owes around $28 million to about 20 unsecured creditors, including his wife Nicole, who is...
Matthew Perrin, the former chief executive of surfwear giant Billabong, has declared personal bankruptcy after failed investments in China left him with debts of around $28 million.   Graham Starkey of chartered accountants PA Lucas & Co was appointed as Perrin's trustee-in-bankruptcy. He has said Perrin's assets are "negligible" and the bulk of Perrin's debts are owed to banks and Chinese investors. Perrin and his wife Nicole were valued at $150 million by BRW
The bankruptcy of former Billabong chief Matthew Perrin is about to get very messy, and the lawyer-turned-entrepreneur could be about to lose his $10 million Surfers Paradise mansion.   Perrin's trustee-in-bankruptcy Graham Starkey has said Perrin's home would not be involved in his personal bankruptcy because it is in the name of his wife Nicole. But The Australian has reported that the administrator of two Perrin family companies that have collapsed ...
The saddest thing about the collapse of a young entrepreneur's empire isn't hearing that the receivers have arrived or that the Ferrari has been repossessed - it's hearing that the poor young thing has been forced to move back in with their parents. Such was the case last week with Daniel Tzvetkoff, a 25-year-old IT entrepreneur whose empire BT Pro...
Shares in surfwear giant Billabong International have plunged 20.5% in two days after the company revealed sales in the company’s key US market plunged in November and slashed its profit forecast. Shares in surfwear giant Billabong International have plunged 20.5% in two days after the company revealed sales in the company’s key US market plunged in November and slashed its profit forecast. The share slide as particularly brutal for company founder Gordon Merchant, who retai...
Workers have always used little carrots to get through the day. It might be the promise of a holiday, perhaps an upcoming birthday or maybe it's just the weekend. But perhaps we need to add another motivation to that list – the chance to get really, really wealthy. That's the message from the recent released BRW Ex...
Telstra has shrugged off recent controversial service records to take the title of Australia's most valuable brand. Brand management agency Interbrand valued the telecommunication giant's brand at $9.7 billion.   Telstra was ranked ahead of Commonwealth Bank (which was valued at $7.1 billion), National Australia Bank ($5.1 billion), Westpac ($4.8 billion) and supermarket giant Woolworths ($4.6 billion). Interbrand says it looked at three factors when valuing a brand...
Gordon Merchant, founder of the Billabong surf wear empire and rich list member, is set to buy Melbourne-based bio plastics manufacturer Plantic Technologies in a deal worth about $10.2 million. Merchant, who was valued at $874 million on the BRW Rich 200, has been a long-time investor in Plantic, which was established in 2001 and is listed on London's Alternative Investment Market. Merchant, who currently owns just under 19% of the company, announced his intention to take the co...
Thales Australia has been forced by Fair Work Australia to reinstate three employees who it dismissed for email misuse including the sending of pornographic images. The engineering company and defence force contractor had dismissed long-term employees Caro...
The latest CommSec Business Sales Indicator suggests the retail industry may finally be starting to pick up, despite research on consumer habits showing customers are dedicated to frugality. A new survey conducted by IBM of over 30,000 consumers suggests retailers need to start personalising their deals and offer tailored discounts in order to get the attention of customers bent on saving their cash. This trend has caught on in the United States, where clothing retailer Gap launched a Fa...
Spring is here and it is time to cut the excuses and give your business a thorough spring clean. SmartCompany has called in the experts to help get the dirty jobs done. TASK ONE: Spring clean your thinking Executive director of
Small businesses must start using experiential marketing to connect with younger shoppers and start focusing their budgets on producing more content online, new research from the Lifelounge Group reveals. Lifelounge chief executive Dion Appel says the company's new Urban Market Research report, completed in conjunction with Sweeney Research, shows younger shoppers value brands such as Nike, Billabong, Smirnoff and Nokia for their emphasis on creating content over simple direct-message ma...
It has not been a good week for those entrepreneurs around the world hoping to get rich from the clean tech sector. In Australia, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's decision to delay his carbon pollution reduction scheme for at least three years has been praised by many sections of the business community, but slammed by local clean tech players already stru...
Australia’s young rich are getting richer. Thanks to buoyant economic conditions you now need more than $18 million to qualify for the BRW rich list for the 40-and-unders. That’s up from $12 million last year. And their combined wealth in 2007 has surged 20% to $4.8 billion.The richest under-40 in Australian is Sydney property developer Shaun Bonnett with a fortune of $300 million. Bonnet owns Precision Group, which has acquired $300 million in commercial prope...
Global surfwear retail giant Billabong has finally moved into the online world with another acquisition, buying niche California-based boardsports website Swell.com. While the acquisition is the company's first venture into online retail, it is just the latest in a string of purchases designed to expand its reach in the US. Billabong has signed a conditional contract to buy ...
Department store Myer is bringing forward its December sales by two days, informing loyalty card holders they can receive “Boxing Day” discounts on Christmas Eve. The decision caps a disastrous fortnight for retail, with Kathmandu, Billabong and JB Hi-Fi among the big names warning of lower profits and tougher conditions. And it comes at a key time for the sector - the Australian Retailers Association says retailers can make up to 40% of their annual sales over the Chris...
The year in wealth always starts with Gerry Harvey and his Magic Millions thoroughbred racing sale. It's a nice guide to how the wealthy are travelling. Last year, the average sale price at Magic Millions was down about 6%, while across the year the wealth of the top 20 members of the Australian rich list was down a...
The seemingly never-ending winter facing Australian retailers was interrupted very briefly last night to let in a bit of Spanish sun reflecting from the opening of the new Zara store in Melbourne. The opening of the store – which comes a few months after the highly successful opening of the chain's first Australian store in Sydney – shows that there is still some life in bricks and mortar retail, in the right circumstances. Of course, how much life is a very vexed question ri...
Retail Adventures, the company behind the Crazy Clark's, Go-Lo, Sam's Warehouse and Chickenfeed brands, is reportedly struggling and has told suppliers to stop deliveries. The revelation comes during a troublesome year for the company. In March, ...
Retailer Noni B has joined a growing chorus of businesses downgrading their profit forecasts, with the company saying rampant discounting and unseasonably cool weather has caused the latest change. The market update comes as retailers are bracing themselves for a shocking Christmas, with the Australian Retailers Association releasing new data yesterday showing just under 65% of retailers are trading below where they were at this point last year. Noni B said in a statement yesterd...
Retail king Gerry Harvey has poured more than $1 million of his own cash into 550,000 more Harvey Norman shares, showing the veteran still has confidence is his company’s ability to ride out the current retail storm. Analysts believe the move is an opportune one, given the company’s shares are so low and it remains profitable. Harvey Norman shares have fallen below $1.90 since Billabong and JB Hi-Fi announced profit downgrades and in trade this morning were down 1.5% to ...
The Commonwealth Bank, 7-Eleven and Westfield are some of the first Australian companies to offer discounts under Facebook's new deals system, it was announced yesterday. The move, part of a wider consumer trend towards digital coupons, confirms these discounts are now being targeted towards smaller geographical locations and individual stores along with larger, city-based deals. It also comes as an Australian app developer has launched a similar program of its own, with brands i...
Gerry Harvey has reluctantly expanded the company’s online operations into a new website that will sell directly import video games, saying the move is a response to the sheer number of sites offering discounted goods. “If you can’t beat them, join them,” Harvey said yesterday. The move comes just weeks after JB Hi-Fi announced a direct import model for camera equipment, and also comes alongside profit downgrades from Billabong and Kathmandu. “We’re not d...
Surf wear giant Billabong will acquire 38 stores from competitor General Pants Group under the Surf Dive'n'Ski and Jetty Surf names, the company announced today. Chief executive Derek O'Neill said in a statement the acquisition, for which a price was not disclosed, will bring the company's global portfolio to 558 stores and will also include two licensed Billabong stores. "SDS was one of Billabong's earliest retail customers so we have had a strong working relationship over many ...
Launa Inman takes her seat at the helm of surfwear company Billabong International on Monday, but she has spent the last couple of days calling and introducing herself to the struggling company's executive leadership team around the globe. As the new CEO, replacing the 20-year incumbent Derek O'Neill, Inman says her priority is a "discovery" phase, during which she will ask leaders across Europe, the United States and Canada, what they think is needed to solve the company's woes, wh...
Traditional retailers have only just begun to witness the growth of e-commerce, a new research note from Morgan Stanley has warned, with digital sales tipped to continue growing at more than 20% every year.  The bank says a combination of high rents and massive price differences will hurt electronics, department store, clothing and book retailers, adding that it has downgraded pric...
Take a battered and cautious consumer, add in fears of further interest rate rises, a strong Australian dollar and rampant discounting, and mix it all with a slew of technological tools designed to push down prices and crush margins. Welcome to the Christmas from hell for Australia's retailers. Rarely before has the sector been ...
Mining billionaire Gina Rinehart has become the first woman to be named Australia's richest person, topping Forbes magazine's list of the 40 richest Australians after her fortune increased from $US2 billion to $US9 billion. There were also a number of new entries from the resources sector, including QCoal's Chris Wallin, Aquila's Tony Poli, Nathan Tinkler and Travers Duncan all making their first appearance on the Forbes list. Rinehart, who inherited her mining c...
Flashy wealth and the white shoe brigade have always had a home at the Gold Coast. But the fast money reputation is fading from memory as companies and entrepreneurs do it hard. JAMES THOMSON looks at who is losing the most.By James Thomson
The Federal Court has dismissed an appeal by sporting goods retailer Paul’s Warehouse and found the company’s importation of Greg Norman branded goods was a trademark infringement in a case hailed as “good news” for Australian trademark owners and licensed distributors. The dispute stemmed from a complex series of transactions that saw Paul’s bring the Greg Norman branded goods into Australia without dealing with the Australian licence holder. A company that repres...
More than 650 retail store closures have been announced since the beginning of the year, and more than 1,600 workers left without jobs – the latest as part of Myer's announcement last week that it would shed 100 staff in order to stay competitive. The figures represent what is becoming one of the worst years for retail in recent history, as businesses struggle against higher costs and competitive pressures, including the growing presence of online companies. Since the begi...
Are we in the midst of a retail downturn? It certainly seems that way, with well-known brands JB Hi-Fi, Billabong and David Jones copping sharemarket dives and analyst downgrades amid warnings of lower profits and tough conditions. Further, the Royal Bank of Scotland says shorting of landlords is on the rise – meaning investors are betting on share price falls for the likes of Westfield, GPT Group and Colonial First State Retail. SmartCompany has been writing ab...
Those who teach business administration courses at our universities might like to consider including a new case study: that of former Billabong boss, Matthew Perrin. Perrin, of course, was the ambitious Gold Coast lawyer turned businessman who enjoyed extraordinary success early in his career. At only 31 years of age, he had $100 million cash in his pocket after selling his stake in the surf wear sensation, Billabong. But in March 2009, Perrin walked into the Brisbane office of a...
There are many lessons from the collapse of Krispy Kreme Australia. Fads never last. American imports don't always find favour in Australia. In retail, getting good locations is everything. But for the wealthy, the big lesson is a bit different – not every little investment works out as planned. From a r...
Outdoor clothing and equipment retailer Kathmandu has suffered a 23% plummet in its share price to $1.27, after the company announced a profit downgrade due to poor Christmas sales. Shares were down 20% to $1.30 at 12.00 AEST. The move comes after JB Hi-Fi and Billabong have announced similar downgrades. In a statement, Kathmandu said it now expects EBITDA for the six months ending January 31 to be lower than the previous corresponding period. Chief executive Peter H...
As 2009 draws to a close, it's time for our annual awards celebrating the best and worst in the world of the wealthy. Best debut It's impossible to go past the story of Paul Fudge, the former fabric trader who made $660...
In releasing both a big financial loss and a new strategic plan, Billabong’s CEO, Launa Inman, stopped short of bagging the lack of financial and commercial discipline in the company she took over in May. The iconic surfwear brand began life as a wholesaler, but later started opening its own shops. With Inman’s appointment ca...
Welcome to the sixth annual roundup of brand good, brand ugly (and brand that should really know better). So without any preamble, the clock on 2012 is ticking down so let’s dive right it – in no particular order. CommBank It’s becoming an annual event. The bank marketing (“rebranding”) campai...
When the selling shareholders argue the business being acquired has unrealised potential and they wish to be compensated for that – the earnout is correctly paid out to all shareholders. However, when the new owners wish to motivate the newly-employed managers to achieve certain objectives or targets, the additional value should be included within ...
The big names behind the retail sector are feeling a chill wind from the cooling economy. By JAMES THOMSON By James ThomsonThe big names behind the retail sector are feeling a chill wind f...
Dare Jennings is adept at picking upcoming trends in business, he founded surf brand Mambo in 1984 then sold out of it 16 years later pocketing $20 million in the process and exiting just before things started to get ugly in surfwear. Now he’s started up customised motorbike brand Deus Ex Machina which is already turning ...
Shares in surfwear giant Billabong International have fallen almost 10% after the company released a shock profit warning this morning. Billabong has warned that net profit in the six months to December 31 will be 8-13% less than in the previous corresponding period. This is despite the company saying just 45 days ago at its annual general meeting that net profit would be "slightly" lower in the first half of the financial year. The company now expects net profit for the ...
ANZ has delivered a 37% profit increase in the June quarter to $1.3 billion, although the company says it is still cautious about the "uncertainty" about the global economic outlook. The bank also recorded an unaudited underlying net profit result of $3.6 billion for the nine months to June, up by 26% from the previous corresponding period. The result comes after Commonwealth Bank caused controversy last week after recording a yearly profit over $6 billion. "Our core bu...
Why has Telstra set up a residential waterway estate in Second Life? Why is it losing money on the lots? Should I stop asking questions and just enjoy the view? Questions, questionsThis past weekend, I decided to become...
It’s been another long, tough year for the members of Australia’s super rich club. A year that started with Gina Rinehart becoming the richest woman in the world will end with commodity prices under pressure and the golden mining sector glow that has lit the Rich List for more than five years seemingly fading.
Gordon Merchant's bioplastics company Plantic Technologies is expecting a 500% increase in sales and hopes to turn a profit for the first time in nine years after securing a supply contract with Coles. Plantic's first deal with a supermarket will see Coles adopt the company's bioplastic product, Plantic eco Plastic, for its fresh food packaging. Merchant, an environmentalist and the founder of surf wear retailer Billabong, acquired Plantic in 2010. The company makes its eco ...