Curtain call for the Habitat chain

As the trustees of home furnishing chain Habitat see no more options to rescue the company, they have initiated a final liquidation.

No cash flow at all

Barely a month after the French chain went into receivership, it is ceasing to exist altogether. Its 25 shops will disappear and 383 employees lose their jobs. It is also the end of the story for parent company Habitat Design International, which employs 68 people and had a turnover of 51.8 million euros in 2022. Besides the French shops, there were also five abroad (in Barcelona, Geneva, Madrid, Milan and Zurich): their fate is as yet unclear.

Earlier this month, the trustees had stated that there was no possibility of drawing up a recovery plan and a complete lack of cash flow, Les Echos reports. It has now also become impossible to continue the brand as the shops have already closed and there are no more sales. Employees complained that shops had not been supplied for five months, while rent and salary payments were also increasingly in default.

End of an era

Owner Thierry Le Guénic admits that Habitat has never been profitable in France and that the hoped-for turnaround has failed. Le Guénic took over the chain in 2020 from the Cafom group, while the British branch went to supermarket group Sainsbury’s. Its shops have been long gone in Britain: Sainsbury’s now only sells a selection of interior products under the brand name.

So ends the life’s work of British designer Terence Conran, who wanted to democratise design at a time when Ikea was still non-existent in our parts. At the end of this year, The Conran Shop in Paris also closed its doors, although that brand still has a British webshop. Its founder died in 2020.