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Fabric put up for sale
By CMU Editorial | Published on Thursday 3 June 2010
Following all that speculation regarding the future of Fabric last week, it was confirmed yesterday that the London nightclub’s parent company has indeed gone into administration and that the club is now up for sale.
A statement on the Fabric website, hidden in tiny font right at the bottom of each page, reads: “Mr David Chubb and Mr Colin Haig [from PriceWaterhouseCoopers] have been appointed as joint administrators of Fabric 591 Limited to manage its affairs, business and property as its agents. The administrators act as agents of the company without personal liability. Both are licensed in the United Kingdom to act as insolvency practitioners by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales”.
As previously reported, Fabric bosses announced they would be shutting Matter, Fabric’s spin off venue under the O2 Dome, for the summer months the week before last. Amid rumours Fabric had guaranteed multi-million pound loans taken out by the loss-making Matter, and that various staff had been made redundant overnight at Fabric HQ, there was wide speculation last week that the clubbing company was on the brink and both Fabric and Matter might shut as a result.
The company issued a statement on Friday that skirted around most of the rumours but said the main Fabric club would stay open as normal for now. It said: “The directors of Fabric are currently dealing with financial problems due to the result of the Jubilee Line closures at Matter. Consequentially, Matter will definitely remain closed throughout summer. However, Fabric will very much remain open as normal, business as usual”.
Confirming that he was now handling the sale of the club, as a going concern, Colin White from property consultants Edward Symmons told Property Week yesterday: “Just 24 hours after being appointed, we have already received a number of enquiries from potential purchasers. We anticipate continued interest in the sale of Fabric, particularly from other major club operators in London and the south east, and we are confident that a purchase will be secured for the business as a going concern”.
It’s not yet clear what PWC plan to do with Matter, or the Fabric record label, though this will presumably become clear in the coming days. Given it seems it was Matter that plunged the otherwise successful Fabric enterprise into this mess, it seems unlikely anyone would want to buy that bit of the Fabric empire, meaning the nightclub under the Dome may now be shut for good. Whether the day-to-day operations of the Fabric club will be affected by the sale also remains to be seen.
