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The owner of value retailer Poundland has agreed to take control of the leases of 71 Wilko stores as the collapsed chain is wound down.
Pepco, the parent company, said the sites were in desirable locations and would be converted to Poundland stores later this year if negotiations with landlords were successful. Poundland already has more than 800 sites in the UK.
The group added it would prioritise hiring Wilko staff, who are facing redundancy after a rescue deal for a large part of the estate could not be found.
Poundland managing director Barry Williams said: “We recognise the last few weeks have been difficult for them [Wilko staff] and we will move quickly to secure new consents from landlords so we can offer them the certainty they deserve.”
The value chain has been adding whole new categories such as clothing, homewares and chilled and frozen food to its stores, in an effort to give shoppers an alternative to supermarkets.
The news comes after Pepco, which also owns the Pepco and Dealz brands in Europe, said earlier on Tuesday that chief executive Trevor Masters would step down with immediate effect.
Andy Bond, chair of the board, will step into the role of executive chair to lead the executive team and overall management of the company until a permanent chief executive is appointed.
Separately, administrators at PwC, who confirmed the agreement with Poundland on Tuesday, said that other retailers were still interested in the remaining Wilko sites and that it hoped to sell the Wilko brand and intellectual property “within the coming days”.
Chris Bonnett, owner of online garden centre GardeningExpress.co.uk, said on Tuesday that he had made an “extremely compelling offer” to acquire the Wilko brand and website.
“I’ve offered what I think is a generous offer to PwC for the Wilko.com brand and business and staff needed to make this work,” he added.
PwC confirmed yesterday that Wilko would disappear from the high street next month, leading to a probable 12,500 redundancies. About 300 stores and its distribution centres will shut in coming weeks as no part of the retail chain could be rescued in its current form despite “extensive efforts”, the administrators added.
