Black Hole

The aftermath of a company going bust is never pleasant.  Orders unfulfilled, clients disappointed, people laid off and of course, creditors unpaid.

Waverley TBS supplied the licensed trade with drinks and has recently gone bust. For years it was simply The Beer Seller, until sold to Scottish and Newcastle where it merged with their beer wholesale operation, Waverley, and became Waverley TBS. Later, in 2010, under Heineken UK, who took over S&N, it was sold off to a mixture of venture capitalists and its management team.  That is now all over and the business is in the hands of the administrators and 580 jobs have gone.

The list of creditors is considerable and debts are reckoned to be over £40 million with some well known names left in the lurch.  Unsurprisingly one of the biggest creditors is Heineken itself. I say unsurprisingly as they had a supply agreement with Waverley TBS.  This £4 million plus hit is exceeded by Diageo at over £6 million and other million plus creditors include Molson Coors, AB InBev and Miller.  Smaller amounts owed include a who's who of British brewing and some are considerable.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth in quite a few Finance Departments and believe me, even at the small end, the two and a half grand owed to Joseph Holt will be like a dagger in their heart. They run a tight ship there.  Others may well be pushed to the brink by this failure.

So all bad news then?  Well more or less, but not entirely.  Looking on the bright side this gap in the market should give SIBA DDS a boost as they rush to fill the gap, but as always when this kind of thing happens, there are more losers than winners and in the short term, less competition and that's always bad.

The Morning Advertiser has the full list of creditors here should you be interested.