Matches set to be placed into administration following Frasers buyout

Matches, the British luxury fashion retailer, is set to appoint administrators – possibly as early as tomorrow – less than three months after it was acquired by Frasers Group.

According to Sky News the retailer has filed an intent to appoint administrators amid continuing losses and a number of brands terminating their relationships.

The news service suggests that the business may be subject to a pre-pack arrangement with Frasers ultimately retaining control, but this is not yet clear.

Just before Christmas, Frasers paid £50 million for Matches, buying it from private equity hours Apax Partners, which itself had paid a reported £800 million for the business in 2017.

Matches was founded around 35 year ago by Tom and Ruth Chapman and began life as a single boutique in London's Wimbledon Village. It expanded into other high-end neighbourhoods including Richmond-upon-Thames, Marylebone and Notting Hill, and in 2018 it opened an experiential, digitally enabled Townhouse shopping experience in Mayfair.

In the mid-2000s Matches entered the online arena and, with that, gained a global reputation in global luxury and became a destination of discovery for up and coming, and niche brands, as well as a home to some of the world's biggest designer names from Saint Laurent to Gucci and Prada.

However, since the sale to Apax, it has faced a revolving door at the top of the business with the CEO at the time of the sale to Apax, Ulric Jerome, departing in 2019. He was replaced in 2020 by Ajay Kavan, a former Amazon executive, who lasted just a year in the role. In September 2021 Paolo De Cesare, formerly of Printemps Group, took over and was gone by July 2022, when former ASOS CEO Nick Beighton took the helm.

Financial results deteriorated during the period and it also closed stores in Richmond-upon-Thames and Notting Hill. In January 2023, Apax injected a further £60 million into the business to fund a turnaround. By the end of the year however, rumours of a sale emerged with Frasers Group, which also owns luxury super-boutique chain Flannels, emerging as the buyer paying a price that was a huge discount on that paid by Apax in 2017.

An announcement about the appointment of administrators could come as soon as tomorrow (8 March) with Frasers stating that the business had continued to miss its business plan targets and to make "material losses". "Whilst Matches' management team has tried to try to find a way to stabilise the business, it has become clear that too much change would be required to restructure it, and the continued funding requirements would be far in excess of amounts that the group considers to be viable. In light of this, Frasers has been informed that the directors of Matches have taken the decision to put the Matches group into administration. Frasers remains committed to the luxury market and its brand partners,” Frasers said.

The fall of Matches comes amid a global downturn in the luxury market, which has seen former high-flyer Farfetch scramble to secure a rescue deal, which led to its delisting from the New York Stock Exchange and the departure of its founder José Neves.

Korean retail giant Coupang acquired Farfetch, the global luxury fashion marketplace, in a deal, finalised in January, which secured $500 million of emergency funding. That deal places in doubt the future of another iconic British fashion boutique, Browns.

Browns, initially founded on South Molton Street in London and now based on nearby Brook Street, had been acquired by Farfetch in 2015. It is understood that Coupang wishes to spin it off, along with brand house New Guards Group which Farfetch bought in 2019, in order to refocus Farfetch on its initial marketplace proposition.