What Went Wrong for Ted Baker?

Struggling fashion designer, Ted Baker has announced that 15 of its retail stores are set to close. The decision comes after administrators identified several outlets that weren’t profitable to keep open.

245 staff members will be forced into unemployment as a result of the closures, with each of the stores ceasing to trade on 19^th April.

Administrators, Teneo, continue to look for a suitable buyer for the rest of the fallen fashion giant. 31 stores and 564 staff remain across the UK and Ireland, but interested parties will need to be wary. Parent company, Authentic Brands Group, have explained that the business has “a significant level of arrears”.

Authentic Brands Group have not been shy in letting everybody know who they blame for the company amassing such debt. Chief Strategy Officer, John McNamara suggests that “the damage done during a period under AARC […] was too much to overcome”. Authentic Brands Group severed ties with the Dutch company after promised investment failed to materialise from the latter.

Unfortunately for Ted Baker, and its soon-to-be-redundant staff, the absence of this expected funding wasn’t the only factor to contribute to the brand’s downfall.

Where does the blame lie?

In 2018, the founder of the brand, Ray Kelvin found himself the subject of a petition from staff to remove him from the company after several misdemeanours. These included the regular kissing of ears, stroking of necks, forced hugs, and the shoving of a senior executive in a heated exchange. Despite his resignation four months later, the damage had already been done, and the negative publicity belied the modern and care-free image that the brand had cultivated over the years. The person in question was no mere staff member. As the founder, Kelvin was practically the brand itself.

Even after Kelvin exited his company, the rest of the board didn’t seem to inspire confidence in a turnaround. A Telegraph opinion piece at the time described how “no one wants a bunch of seventy something males in charge of fixing a lost fashion brand”. Chairman David Bernstein, and non-executives Andrew Jenings and Ronald Stewart were all septuagenarians at the time. As it happened, this article was proven right, and Bernstein stepped down soon afterwards. Rachel Osborne took over the reins in an attempt to revive the flagging brand, but a major headwind was about to rock the ailing business further

Lockdown hits hard

It’s fair to say that the pandemic put a serious dent in Ted Baker’s operations. While offices were closed nationwide, there was understandably little call for suits and formal office wear. The resultant wave of businesses providing work-from-home and hybrid options afterwards only compounded this problem further. This meant that not only did their bricks and mortar retail arm suffer as badly as everybody else’s, but their e-commerce offering didn’t experience the uplift that others did either.

Rachel Osborne left Ted Baker in June 2023, her tenure not bringing about the upturn in fortunes that had been hoped. With a damaged reputation, an unstable hierarchy, and debts still to pay, any potential buyer will have a challenge on their hands to revive this sleeping retail giant.

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