Rivers future in Deni still unclear

KPMG has this week told a number of national news outlets that clothing line Katies will be removed from the company’s brands.

All 80 Katies stores will be closed by mid-January.

It also said a further 80 Millers, Rivers and Noni B brick-and-mortar shopfronts will shut in the same period.

The Pastoral Times has requested more information about the next steps in the process, and sought confirmation on whether the Deniliquin store would be impacted by the closures.

KPMG said it could not confirm the location of stores yet, but said decisions would be made on trading performance.

As the owner of the building where Rivers is located, Lester Wheatley is hoping the “no news is good news” term applies in this case.

“They (the creditors) have not been in contact with me directly, and they still paid the next month’s rent on time,” Mr Wheatley said.

“When I was speaking to Mosaic Brands before the voluntary administration they asked if we would provide a five year lease and they had no intentions of closing the Deniliquin store.

“But of course now they’re in administration nothing is guaranteed.”

Announced via the Australian Stock Exchange in October, Mosaic Brands Limited said the decision to enter voluntary administration was made after failed attempts to “informally restructure its operations”.

This restructure was to include “rationalising the Group's Brand and store portfolio and focusing on key growth brands, reducing costs and improving Mosaic's working capital position”.

The decision to close the Katies stores is a pivot from advice provided by Mosaic Brands before administration.

In a business update posted on the ASX website on September 30, the company proposed dropping the Rockmans, Autograph, Crossroads, W.Lane and BeMe brands, instead investing more in the core brands of Millers, Noni B, Rivers and Katies.

Deniliquin’s Rockmans store was merged into Rivers when it opened in Cressy St in 2021, in a building left empty by Target.