Canada's oldest company, put into liquidation by American hedge fund
In a late Friday announcement, Canada's oldest company said it couldn't secure the necessary financing to keep at least some of its empire alive.
You're viewing a single thread.
I have a lot of nostalgia for the Bay. But shipping there sucks: it took forever to find an attendant, staff ignored customers, and selection was sparse. There may be good reasons for that, but it was alienating to customers.
On top of that:
She said customers likely noticed the lack of investment by Hudson’s Bay into its physical stores, where it wasn’t uncommon to find non-functioning escalators that went unrepaired for long periods of time. Amlani also pointed to several stores in the Vancouver area that temporarily closed last summer related to problems with air-conditioning systems.
She said another problem the company ran into in recent years was that its stores’ hours didn’t always align with that of the malls where they are located.
It's shitty that 10k people will probably lose their jobs because the company was so poorly managed.
She said another problem the company ran into in recent years was that its stores’ hours didn’t always align with that of the malls where they are located.
That's the case where I live: the mall opens at 10, but the Bay doesn't open until 11.
I've also found it hard to identify their target audience. With women's clothes, for example, they have a ton of stuff that says "hi, I'm 21" and a ton of stuff that says "hi, I'm 75" and... not really a lot in between. It's pretty confusing.
The crazy part is a 'Canadian' company that runs out of winter wear in November. Many problems with the business, but the whole Saks thing was a complete bust. Trying to do luxury when they aren't even doing ecommerce and retail basics for the year 2000 is obviously a going out of business strategy. Situation is that hedge funds have no idea how to run businesses, they just extract value if it goes well or juice the husk and discard if it doesn't and move on. Their path of destruction through the US and Canada destroys livelihoods and our economic capabilities. For some people, this is extremely profitable. Amazon comes to mind.
That's the point of a bunch of these hedge funds, they are strip miners they aren't in it to run the business and never were, it's an expected outcome that the remainder fails and someone else (the suppliers/lenders) are left holding the bag.
When you get a chance look up “cellar boxing”. Hedge funds have been doing it for a very very long time. Sears, AMC, Bed Bath & Beyond and a whole lot more.
It's shitty that 10k people will probably lose their jobs because the company was so poorly managed.
And adds to the shitty situation that people (like my university age kids) are already having with being unable to find work that isn't abusive schedules and limited hours for minimum wages.
