A leading kitchen retailer and supplier in the UK has tabled a bid for Poggenpohl’s UK operations, kbbreview understands.
The bid is also believed to cover other territories but does not contain Poggenpohl’s operations in Germany – including its manufacturing facilities.
Liam Hopper, the boss of the Leicht Kitchen Design Centre group, has put forward a bid dependent on German administrators dividing the company up and selling it off piecemeal
This means they would’ve failed to find an overall buyer for the company and its global network of showrooms.
Hopper currently runs four Leicht Kitchen Design Centres – two in London and two in Kent – and its successful contracts operation.
All the kitchen showrooms have come from failed businesses that Hopper has snapped up, The most recent being the Hamstead showroom of Neil Lerner – ironically, next door to Poggenpohl Hampstead, formerly known as Norman Glenn.
At the end of May, kbbreview also revealed that Lux Group Holdings, the owner of Smallbone of Devizes, Mark Wilkinson and McCarron & Co, was believed to be ‘close’ to a deal to buy the troubled German kitchen brand, kbbreview understands.
That purchase would cover Poggenpohl globally.
German administrators were appointed at the end of April and said parent company Poggenpohl Möbelwerke GmbH had seen a ‘considerable decline in orders and sales since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic’.
Recently, German press speculated that Chinese retail giant Red Star Macalline and family-owned German logistics outfit Schröter Zeitfach KG were also possible candidates for saving the company.