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Married, beware.
David's Bridal, the country's largest retailer of wedding dresses, announced this week that it plans to file for bankruptcy "very soon" – and have a pre-damage check.
The retailer based in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, announced Thursday that it has entered into a restructuring agreement with "the vast majority" of its lenders to reduce the debt by $ 400 million. It has also secured new funding of $ 40 million to continue operating.
Anxious to calm customers, Chief Executive Scott Key released a video on Thursday promising that customers would "see no change in service" in his 300 stores, ensuring that all orders and changes would be delivered "on time".
Worried wives Friday scrambled phone lines and rushed to the shops, including Big Apple, in the Flatiron district, to demand assurances that they would get the dresses they bought, according to sources. .
Wives with already exhausted nerves may have reason to worry: the last time a big bridal chain collapsed, thousands of wives did not get the dresses they had paid for.
Alfred Angelo, who made and sold dresses in his 60 stores and in 1,400 other retailers worldwide, unexpectedly wound up in July 2017, leaving hundreds of brides in trouble.
At the time, David's Bridal was looking to take advantage of the disaster by offering excluded customers a 40% discount on a new dress.
But now, the 60-year-old company, caught off guard by an increasingly active online industry and gaining new competitors, is struggling to avoid Alfred Angelo's fate.
"For 60 years, David's has delivered to our customers on time, and the announcement announced today allows us to maintain this tradition for many years," said Key in a statement.
The company's new competitors, including a multitude of young online businesses, are one of the reasons it struggles.
Former David's Bridal leader Angela Ning, who worked there for a decade, says the company now controls about a third of the market, up from 50 percent 15 years ago. Ning, based in Hong Kong, has since joined the competitor Anomaly, who makes custom dresses.
"Fashion trends have changed old school dresses and puffy sleeves," Ning told The Post. "Customers wanted more options than David's offered."
Indeed, a stylist at a David's Bridal store in Virginia admitted that she was selling 25% off the chain to buy her own wedding dress at Anomaly.
The saleswoman, who did not want to be identified, took the picture of a $ 3,200 dress that she found in another shop and Anamolie is making it for half price.
"About half of the people who enter the Virgina store," said the associate, "are looking for something we do not wear."
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