Premier Retail shuts stores, stands down staff, withholds rent

Retail heavyweight Premier is closing all stores, standing down all 9000 staff and telling its landlords it won’t be paying rent.

Premier is closing all its retail outlets, which include Smiggle, and standing 9000 staff down. Picture: AAP

In one of the single biggest blows to the nation’s embattled retail sector billionaire Solomon Lew has announced the shock closure of all stores within his Premier Investments business, which includes popular fashion chains such as Just Jeans, Portmans, Dotti, Peter Alexander and Smiggle, with the loss of more than 9000 jobs.

Premier said it intended not to pay any rent to landlords during the shut down, triggering a possible battle with shopping centre owners.

Premier called the moves the “hardest decision ever made” by the company. It will add to the tens of thousands of workers already out of a job following mass closures from stores such as Michael Hill, Athlete’s Foot, Noni B, Katies, Millers and more than 20,000 workers across the nation’s casinos.

Premier, which is chaired and 43 per cent owned by retail billionaire Mr Lew, said following health advice from the federal government and directives on people not leaving their homes, it had no choice but to temporarily close all retail stores in Australia from 6pm local time today until 9am local time on Wednesday 22 April. This followed similar decisions Premier has been forced to take in New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and Republic of Ireland.

“Regrettably, this means all employees in Australia are to be stood down, except for a small number of employees required to perform limited essential work. This means our team members will not attend work and will not be paid. We have put in place special arrangements for employees to access accrued annual and long service leave entitlements to reduce the impact over this time,’’ Premier said in its statement to the ASX.

These closures affect more than 9000 employees in the Premier stable of fashion stores and in its head office.

Chief executive of Premier Retail Mark McInnes would work from home without pay or any other entitlements for the period of the shutdown, Premier said. In addition, the entire Just Group executive team have been stood down and has agreed to work from home when required, with either no pay or reduced leave entitlements.

Similarly, Premier non-executive directors have decided to not receive any remuneration during the shutdown period.

Premier said that in Australia and New Zealand close to 70 per cent of its stores were already in holdover or had leases expiring in 2020, providing the company with flexibility. Premier intended not to pay any rent globally for the duration of the shutdown, it said.

“Premier will provide further updates when new information becomes available but no later than April 21,” the company said in its statement.