French fashion group IKKS enters receivership

The PhoenIKKS hasn’t spread its wings. A few months ago, French premium women’s ready-to-wear group IKKS presented a makeover for its flagship label IKKS, a brand with a rocker vibe founded in 1987. The project, initiated in early 2024 and labelled PhoenIKKS, featured a renewed brand image and style, and included a redundancy plan leading to 202 job cuts in France (out of 1,328 employees) and the closure of 77 stores and retail corners (out of a total 604). The operation eventually led to the loss of 140 jobs for the group based in Saint-Macaire-en-Mauges in the Cholet region, with offices also in Paris’s Marais district.

In June last year, the group led by Ludovic Manzon, which owns the IKKS, I.Code and One Step brands, agreed to restructure its debt and carry out a refinancing operation with creditors Avenue Capital, CarVal Investors and Marathon Asset Management, which had bought the group in 2019.

IKKS’s four-year plan included a new focus on profitable activities, and aimed to generate €15 million in savings in order to improve productivity and meet debt repayment deadlines. The group managed to gain some time through the debt restructuring, but is still facing repayment tranches worth several tens of millions of euros within five years.

It now appears that the group has not been able to revitalise its business performance, and the Paris trade court announced that IKKS was placed in receivership on October 2. The group itself had applied for the receivership procedure, according to a report published last week by local paper Le Courrier de l’Ouest, which wrote that the group informed the employees of this decision on September 26.

The group’s various entities, IKKS Groupe, One Step and HoldIKKS, are all party to the legal proceedings opened on October 2, which relate to the group’s business in France. IKKS also has branches in several European countries.

The group, which stopped paying creditors in mid-September, employs more than 1,000 people and operates stores in many French cities. Its activity will be monitored by the court until April 2026. The group did not disclose its financial results for 2024. Management has been contacted by FashionNetwork.com, but hasn’t yet replied. IKKS is currently offering significant promotional discounts both in-store and on its e-shop. According to local press reports, US groups Avenue Capital, CarVal Investors and Marathon Asset Management are now keen to sell their stakes in IKKS.