Carpetright rival buys 54 shops in rescue deal but more than 1,500 jobs will go

More than 1,500 jobs are to go at Carpetright as a rescue deal for the retailer by its rival Tapi Carpets & Floors saves only a fifth of its stores and 300 employee roles.

The multimillion-pound deal, finalised on Monday, includes 54 stores but not Carpetright’s head office in Purfleet, Essex, while another 219 shops will close.

The advisory firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has been looking for a buyer for Carpetright after it filed a notice of intention to appoint an administrator earlier in July.

It said 1,018 jobs would go immediately in the pre-pack administration deal while a further 580 jobs, mostly at the group’s head office, are expected to go once the handover to Tapi is complete.

Customers around the country will also face disappointment, as PwC said orders placed with stores not included in the deal could not be fulfilled. It suggested affected customers contact their payment card provider about the possibility of obtaining a refund.

Zelf Hussain, a joint administrator, said: “Carpetright has fallen victim to challenges facing many retailers, especially those selling big-ticket items.”

He said other factors including a big reduction in consumer spending due to cost of living pressures, lower home sales and a “debilitating cyber-attack” in April this year made it “impossible for the business to continue in its current form”.

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Tapi has been a bitter rival to Carpetright since it was co-founded in 2015 by Martin Harris, the son of the “carpet king” Lord Harris of Peckham. Harris launched Tapi a year after he and his father stepped down as directors of Carpetright, which Lord Harris founded in 1988.

Martin Harris left Tapi earlier this year, while Lord Harris remains an investor and adviser to the business.

The acquisition of Carpetright would enable Tapi to expand into a number of new areas, the company said. Lord Harris continues to have a role on the board of Tapi, which he co-owns with about 1,000 investors, the largest of which is the executive chair, Will Barker of the US investment firm Camelot Capital Partners.

Tapi, which has 170 stores, said in a statement it was “desperately sad not to have been able to save more of the business and customer orders”.

Jeevan Karir, the managing director of Tapi, added: “Our goal, initially, was to try to save all of Carpetright. However, as we looked into the details of the situation, we quickly established that saving the entire business was unviable. The business has been materially loss-making for a number of years and it has significant debt held by the owner.”

The group said another reason it had not taken on more Carpetright stores was because it was “mindful of how the Competition and Markets Authority may view a larger deal”.

Carpetright, which was once FTSE listed, was bought and taken private in 2019 by Meditor, the British hedge fund headed by the poker player Talal Shakerchi. Sales are understood to have fallen more than 45%, to £200m, in the past year, while losses have mounted to more than £25m in recent years along with more than £150m in external debt.

Kevin Barrett, the chief executive of Nestware Holdings, the Meditor-controlled group that ran Carpetright, said: “We have tried everything to turn Carpetright around and I’m truly sorry that we were unable to save more jobs. The deal will not affect Carpetright in Europe or other brands within Nestware Holdings including Keswick and Trade Choice.

“The Floor Room will continue to trade and serve customers via concessions at John Lewis and we will be working hard to secure job opportunities across these businesses to support Carpetright staff wherever we can.”