"Tweeter abruptly shuts stores, fires 600; Chain's liquidation leaves customers, workers in a lurch" by Jenn Abelson, Globe Staff | December 3, 2008
Bankrupt electronics chain Tweeter yesterday converted its case to a Chapter 7 liquidation, abruptly shuttered its stores, and fired more than 600 employees at 70 stores across the country, days before the company was set to close for good.
The employees, including roughly 150 in Massachusetts, are still owed at least one week's pay, vacation time, and hundreds of thousands of dollars in bonuses that were promised as part of the liquidation sale, according to five store managers and executives who declined to be named because they are still owed money. Customers are unable to pick up merchandise they had already purchased and the liquidators handling the closing also have not been paid. Meanwhile, there is roughly $14 million worth of goods left in the locked stores.
Too bad they closed; business was going great!
"incentives have helped to motivate employees - most are earning more money now than they once received under Tweeter. For example, managers are receiving up to $300 extra weekly based on sales. Other employees are now earning 5 percent of everything they sell, better than the 5 percent of profit under Tweeter."
Well, ENJOY IT while it LASTS, guys, because it WON'T BE FOR LONG (how prophetic)!!!
Related: The Liquidator
Amazing that GOING OUT of BUSINESS is GOOD for BUSINESS, huh?
The owners of the chain, Schultze Asset Management, shut down Tweeter and filed for Chapter 7 after they paid off millions of dollars to the largest secured creditor - Wells Fargo. Schultze Asset Management, a New York investment firm that had also loaned money to Tweeter, was the second-biggest creditor and decided against putting additional money into the company to cover expenses to wind down the operations. Tweeter had planned to close its shops on Sunday.
Hey, at least the CREDITORS (banks) were payed off and that is the MOST IMPORTANT THING!
A spokeswoman for Hudson Capital Partners, one of the firms running Tweeter's going-out-of business sale, declined to discuss the matter. Tiger Capital Group, another liquidator, did not return calls seeking comment. Kenneth Howell, who worked as a store manager for the Tweeter shop in Burlington, said he received a call yesterday morning from an operations manager that he should not show up to work and if he entered the building, he would be responsible for any lost merchandise....
"The employees don't deserve this. It's bad enough to be liquidated," Howell said. "But to be shut out of the stores, without wages and everything else owed. And now customers can't get their merchandise. It's totally unfair and pretty sad."
WTF you mean I CAN'T GET MY MERCH?!!! I PAID for that piece of electronic shit, and the CUSTOMER is ALWAYS RIGHT, right? Right?
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