Case Studies

Receivership of E-Commerce Company

J.S. Held Acquires Shechter & Everett to Expand Forensic Accounting Capabilities for Family Law Disputes in Florida

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The Situation

A leading specialty e-commerce retailer’s working capital declined when management failed to reduce operating expenses in line with an industry-wide downturn in sales.  A long-standing legal battle with its lender depleted cash flow further, resulting in a bankruptcy filing that ultimately was dismissed. The company’s inventory became depleted due to lack of capital and credit, and it became delinquent on its mortgage.

After a long legal battle between the company and its bank, including a bankruptcy filing and litigation against the lender, the bank sought the appointment of a receiver.  The borrower ultimately stipulated to the receiver’s appointment.

How We Advised

Upon appointment as receiver of the company, our experts quickly maximized its secured lender’s recovery, in less than two months, by:

  • Designing and implementing a strategy to 1) maximize cash flow and 2) preserve the company’s brand value.
  • Clearly communicating the strategy so that the borrower agreed to stipulate to all sales, thereby avoiding the time-consuming and expensive process of seeking court approval.
  • Staging a successful close-out sale to liquidate inventory, including odd-lots (i.e. incomplete size-runs, leftover colors, etc.), via the company’s email campaign system, resulting in sales at approximately 90% of cost vs. previous offers at 20-30% of cost.
  • Running a competitive M&A process to sell the business as a going-concern, including its e-commerce site, customer lists, intellectual property (domain names, trademarks, etc.) and other intangible assets.
  • Generating additional proceeds through the sale of fixed assets.

Obstacles & Our Solutions

  • The company had a lot of odd-lot inventory, the value of which had deteriorated significantly in the 60-90 days preceding our appointment as receiver. Prospective purchasers’ offers were only 20-30% of cost.
    • We worked with management and existing staff to quickly stage a close-out sale through time-automated e-blasts to the company’s subscriber list, generating substantial sales at approximately 90% of cost.
    • The increased sales volume enabled us to continue staff’s employment, with benefits.
  • Third parties were making piecemeal offers for inventory, customer lists, soft assets, etc.
    • Our experts conducted a competitive sell side M&A process, targeting prospective buyers, organizing due diligence materials and widely-marketing the asset sale to 25+ parties.
    • We managed due diligence and negotiated with all interested buyers to encourage comprehensive offers for all of the company’s remaining inventory and soft assets.
    • We ultimately qualified 3 bidders, collected deposits from each, and staged a live auction resulting in bids 3x their original offers.
  • Certain former employees who had been laid off were going to lose their health insurance.
    • We created a plan and worked with the HR manager and health insurance company to retain health coverage for current employees and COBRA eligibility for former employees for two additional months.
  • Miscellaneous furniture, fixtures & equipment and other assets remained at the business site, cluttering the building which might be added to the receivership to be sold by our team.
    • We sold the items, recovering additional cash for the lender while preparing the building to be shown to prospective buyers in the future.

Related Practice Areas

> Receiverships
Federal and state courts, creditors, and legal counsel choose our team to serve as Receiver of distressed businesses and real estate entities. We stabilize operations and cash flow, safeguard business assets, and pursue methods to maximize financial recovery. Our multidisciplinary team applies a wide breadth of restructuring and industry experience as Receiver to take control of companies facing financial, operational, and legal issues.

 

> Solutions for Distressed Situations
We deliver integrated solutions for distressed and insolvent businesses that maximize recovery, mitigate risk, and restore enterprise value. Our experts are retained to help distressed organizations stabilize operations, protect stakeholder interests, and execute turnaround strategies. We take an operationally-focused approach that looks beyond the balance sheet to minimize further degradation and build a path to sustainable growth.

Key Contact

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