Gymboree to shut down after second bankruptcy fails

Gymboree approaches its end. The childrenswear giant has filed for bankruptcy again. The San Francisco-based company plans to close its Gymboree and Crazy 8 chains after failing to find anyone willing to buy them, according to Bloomberg. On the other hand, Goldman Sachs appears to be interested in bidding for Janie and Jack, the group’s higher-end chain.

The retailer, one of the largest childrenswear groups in the world, filed for protection from creditors owed about 212 million in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.

“The combination of declining profitability and general market uncertainty has hampered the Debtors’ ability to sustain their funded debt burden and to commit the capital necessary for investing in their operations,” Stephen Coulombe, Gymboree’s chief restructuring officer said in a court filing”. “Poorer-than-expected product sales led to deep in-store merchandise discounting.”, he went on.

This is the second time in two years that Gymboree has filed for bankruptcy. The first one was in June 2017, with a 1.34 billion dollar debt. Gymboree operates 900 stores, after closing more than 300 in 2017.