Two partial takeover offers were submitted for the shoe retailer André, which has been in insolvency proceedings since April. These were published on Thursday by the Paris Commercial Court.
The first of these offers comes from the Breton Beaumanoir group. She is the owner of Sarenza and has already taken over Naf Naf, Jennyfer and La Halle in the past. The group offers to purchase all of André’s brands and the associated domain names for 500,000 euros. Beaumanoir intends to “reposition these in the medium term (…)” and sell them in its own La Halle branches or on the Sarenza online marketplace. Beaumanoir’s offer does not mention the takeover of any business or employees. According to a document from the Paris Commercial Court, André only employs 47 people.
The second offer was made by the current managing director of André’s owning company, Belgian businessman Karim Redjal. He proposes retaining six stores, two corners and ten employees through a newly founded subsidiary. Of these, eight would work in the stores and two at the headquarters. Karim Redjal bought André in 2023. He took over 119 employment contracts for 701,000 euros.
At that time, he wanted to revitalize the shoe chain, particularly by modernizing the stores and reducing costs. According to the takeover offer, André was confronted with a “stumbling economy (…)” and the “burden of rising rents” despite a “capital injection of more than six million euros”. In this context, insolvency proceedings were opened for André at the end of April. It’s the third time in five years.
With its offering, Redjal intends to “focus on its most profitable businesses.” André’s management initially did not respond to inquiries from the AFP news agency.
In May, the Cyrillus brand had already offered to take over the business operations of an André store in La Rochelle. These offers can still be improved until the court makes a decision. The court may then accept one or more offers.
The French ready-to-wear industry is going through a deep crisis. After the Covid pandemic, it is being rocked by runaway inflation and competition from Asian websites like Shein.
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