Bloomlocal in £2.2 million liquidation
Bloomlocal Group Ltd, set up by Florismart founder Steve France to sell flowers via local florists and partner couriers, has filed for voluntary liquidation.
The company had a previous compulsory strike-off suspended in April 2023 following an objection, but an extraordinary resolution to wind up was made on 24th May 2023 with full details of the financial position made public at Company House on June 5th.
BloomLocal Group Ltd is not to be confused with BloomDirect, the wholesale division which whilst still registered at Company House appears to have ceased operations back in April or Bloomlocal UK Ltd which was dissolved via compulsory strike-off on 7th February 2023.
The company appointed to handle the liquidation is ReSolve Advisory Ltd, a company which specialises in restructuring companies who find themselves in trouble.
The debt situation as shown at Companies House lists creditors at £2,241,884.35. Google Ireland are the largest creditor with an outstanding of £574,443.62 followed by HMRC who are owed £339,156.84 for unpaid PAYE and VAT. Hong Kong based software developers Arcanys Labs One are owed £297k, American Express are owed £105k, and digital financing companies ClearCo and Viceversa Capital £139k between them.
On the retail/wholesale side some 200 independent retail florists are owed circa £400k ranging from £19 to £22k with other big debts owed to Arena Flowers (£52k), Flower Station (£48k), The Flower Shop Southampton (£46k), and Flowers by McDowell (£45k). The Directors loan account shows they are owed £196k whilst shareholders have lost £481K.
Against the debts the statement of affairs shows uncharged assets with a book value of £567k which includes £562k for Software but only £4,094 is expected to be realised unless, we assume, a sale of the assets and goodwill can be made although currently the Bloomlocal website is showing as closed. However, given HMRC will, as preferred creditors take any monies raised, it seems there will be nothing available for other creditors.
We spoke to Ben Woodthorpe, one of the appointed liquidators at ReSolve. Although unable to tell us much due to both legalities and the early stages of the process – particularly in relation to any possible sale of the assets or what was happening with the websites built on behalf of florists and controlled by Bloom Local - he advised that a letter was going out to all creditors. Not only will it contain all the information but give creditors an opportunity to feed back any information they think is relevant to the situation as part of the process is to investigate all activities of the company and the Directors.
*** Since publishing this story we have been advised by some creditors that a new company, The Flower Shops Network, with similar owners and shareholders, has bought the assets and will be recommencing trading shortly. We will try to find out more.
If you want to see the full position regarding Bloom Local the paperwork can be accessed at Company House here
