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Bankrupt specialty retailer Sharper Image Corp. said Thursday its chairman Jerry W. Levin resigned from the company's board and plans to join with other investors on a bid for some or all of the San Francisco-based company's assets.
In a statement announcing the news, Sharper Image's new CEO Robert Conway said the company intended to "give full consideration to any proposal that may be made to acquire the company's business or assets," but that it could not guarantee any offer would be forthcoming.
Sharper Image is one of several retailers to find itself in bankruptcy protection of late, but it shouldn't have come as a surprise, The Deal's Matt Miller wrote recently: The chain had been losing both money and customers steadily since 2005, upended after Consumer Reports blasted the chain's best-selling product, a line of expensive air filters, followed quickly by class actions. But instead of retooling and recasting, management spent funds repurchasing shares. Meanwhile, receivables were crashing. Inventory was stacking up. "They were doing all these dumb things," says Vincent Lambiase, a managing director with business advisory firm BBK, who studied the chain in 2005. "We saw it coming back then."Sharper Image didn't change how it did business or its product mix, which proved to be a costly mistake. Sun Capital Partners Inc., which buys both retail companies and those in distress, is an investor. For more on PE-backed bankruptcies and home furnishing retailers in trouble, see Dealwatch. - Carolyn Murphy See Sharper Image press release See Dealscape: Sun Capital hits bankruptcy trifecta See TheDeal.com story: The coming catastrophe See Dealwatch: PE-backed bankruptcies See Dealwatch: Home furnishing retailers CategoriesComments Deal Video
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where's the mention of Levin's recently filed JWL Acquisition SPAC