American Apparel Goes Into Bankruptcy

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Oct 5, 6:46AM EDT · Published Oct 5, 4:18AM EDT

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With its stock trading in $0.11, and ongoing battles with former CEO Dov Charney, American Apparel has filed for Chapter 11. The action was prepacked and included some of its debt holders. Now, the retailer has to show it can survive in any form, with customers going elsewhere to buy competitive products. The holiday season may be the determination of its fate.

The company announced:

American Apparel, Inc., (the Company) (NYSE MKT: APP), a vertically-integrated manufacturer, distributor, and retailer of branded fashion-basic apparel, announced today that it has reached a restructuring support agreement with 95% of its secured lenders to implement a pre-arranged financial restructuring. This reorganization will enable the Company to implement a comprehensive transformation strategy to revitalize the business and brand, while keeping its production and operations in the U.S. Throughout the implementation of this process, American Apparel will continue to operate its business without interruption to customers, employees and vendors.

Also:

The restructuring support agreement, which has been approved by the Company’s board of directors, will substantially reduce the Company’s debt and interest payments through the elimination of over $200 million of its bonds in exchange for equity interests in the reorganized Company, and provide the Company with access to financing during and after its restructuring. As part of this agreement, American Apparel, and certain of its domestic subsidiaries have voluntarily filed to reorganize under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware (the “Bankruptcy Court”). The Company expects to complete the restructuring within approximately six months

And:

Under the restructuring support agreement, American Apparel’s secured lenders will provide approximately $90 million in debtor-in-possession (DIP) financing. These supporting creditors have committed $70 million of new capital to support the reorganization and recapitalization of the business. The Company anticipates that such financing will be more than sufficient to fund its ongoing operations and pave the way for a successful reorganization. As a result of the reorganization, American Apparel’s debt will be reduced from $300 million to no more than $135 million, and annual interest expense will decrease by $20 million.

American Apparel hopes to keep just over 100 stores open.

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.