Sandwich chain Benjys’ 47-shop estate is being broken up, after it went into administration on 6 February for the second time in a year.
Private equity firm Hamilton Bradshaw, which bought Benjys in July, appointed KPMG administrators after building up rent arrears. However, the leases of 41 sites had not yet been transferred over from the group’s previous administrator, the private equity firm Deloitte.
A Deloitte spokesman said it was acting in the creditors’ best interests, but refused to be drawn on potential buyers. It is understood that London sandwich chain Eat may buy 12 of the sites and bakery chain Paul is also rumoured to be looking at sites. KPMG has control of five of Benjys’ site leases. It has made 400 redundancies and reported it was negotiating with two "household names" over a possible sale.
Benjys’ factory in east London and seven distribution centres - two in Birmingham, two in London, Milton Keynes, Sevenoaks and Warrington - have been closed.
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