Land deal halts plan to save flower firm

A €19 million land deal has halted an attempt to save one of the State's biggest wholesale florist businesses.

The operations of the Interbloem group of companies, which went into liquidation earlier this month, were transferred with the approval of the High Court to a new business, Beautiful Flowers, run by Interbloem director, Brendan Chambers.

The new company has been trading successfully for the last three weeks from Interbloem's premises at Corkagh on the Naas Road, Dublin. It kept on the original firm's 51 workers.

However, members of the Duke family which owned Interbloem this week agreed to sell the 19-acre site which houses the flower-cutting and distribution operations for an estimated €1 million an acre.

The sale is conditional on the new owner getting vacant possession. Beautiful Flowers told the workforce this week that it had no choice but to wind up its operations today. The business only occupies a portion of the site.

Brothers Thomas and Patrick Duke and businessman Philip Gilworth owned the land in partnership, and leased it to Interbloem Holdings, the group's holding company. They have agreed the sale of the property and the deal is likely to be completed early next week. The buyer's identity is not known.

Thomas Duke and his wife, Maeve, are shareholders and directors of Interbloem. Mr Chambers does not have a stake in it, but came into the company as a director and consultant two years ago.

Mr Chambers' company, Beautiful Flowers was given the licence to continue the business temporarily under a provision of insolvency law that allows the High Court to grant this where the liquidator believes it is in the creditors' best interest.

The provision has only been used a dozen times in company insolvency cases. The court initially grants the licence for a short period of time, normally weeks, but it is open to the liquidator to seek to have this extended.

The company bought Interbloem's outstanding stock and made agreements with the original group's suppliers to purchase stock for Mothers' Day, March 26th, one of the busiest times in that sector.

Beautiful Flowers took over Interbloem contracts to supply supermarket chains Superquinn and Tesco up to the end of this month.

Tesco recently switched its flower supply contract to Keelings, which already provides it with fresh fruit and vegetables.

It is understood that Mr Chambers provided funds of €400,000-€500,000 to enable the business to trade.

The company's purchase of Interbloem stock means that suppliers who retained title of their goods will be paid directly.

Creditors should also benefit to a certain extent from the land sale, as Interbloem Holdings will be compensated for the termination of its lease and it is understood that this should be available for distribution.