Fashion group Vivarte sells André and Naf Naf

French fashion group Vivarte sold its shoe chain André and its fashion chain Naf Naf. Its new CEO, who took charge in October 2016, has been working on a restructuring plan to slim down the company and this is part of that process.

Naf Naf sale is a surprise

Shoe chain André has 135 stores and 786 employees. It already had to deal with the sale of 55 stores back in September, but only a month later, CEO Patrick Puy said more stringent measures were needed if the group was to survive. Following rumours in January that André would be sold, it comes as no surprise the company actually sold it. However, the sale of the fashion chain Naf Naf, with more than 400 stores worldwide is a complete surprise. 

During an extraordinary general assembly of shareholders on Monday, the company announced it would restructure the La Halle chain and Vivarte Services, which takes care of all supporting activities within the group. It also announced it would sell several brands, but did not reveal any numbers about how many people would lose their job.

Vivarte has struggled for a long time: back in August 2014, 12 investment funds had to buy off 116 debtors for more than 2 billion euro and it simultaneously launched a 500 million euro fund to get the group back on track.