Oddbins in admin move as it bids for CVA lifeline

Wine retailer Oddbins, which has 19 stores across Scotland, has applied to go into administration in a move to try and buy it time as it seeks to secure the future of the business.

The struggling off-licence chain, which recently shut nearly 40 outlets across the UK, wants to restructure its debts through a company voluntary arrangement (CVA) but needs the backing of 75 per cent of creditors at a meeting on Thursday for the rescue deal to go through.

Oddbins said it had put in the administration application to protect it from creditor claims in the run up to the meeting after it received a winding-up order from creditor British Gas.

An Oddbins spokeswoman said: "This is purely a precautionary measure to allow the CVA to take place."

She added the move would allow Oddbins, which has about 90 remaining stores, a "moratorium over any claims of ten days, after which the results for the CVA vote will be known".

The voting results for the CVA, which has been put together by Deloitte, will be released on 4 April.

Oddbins is under pressure amid competition from the dominant supermarket chains and falling consumer confidence.

It is also involved in a long-running legal dispute with the group's previous owner, French drinks group Castel Freres.

Simon Baile, whose father ran the company in the 1970s, took control of Oddbins in 2008 and in December launched Oddies, a new smaller store concept.

Oddbins is the second off-licence business to hit difficulties in the past six months following the collapse of First Quench, which operated under the names Threshers, Wine Rack, The Local, Haddows, Bottoms Up and Victoria Wine.

It later emerged that First Quench owed 41m to unsecured creditors, many of them key wine suppliers. Another UK chain, Unwins, folded in 2005.