Everything must go. Wet Seal, which filed for bankruptcy last week, is selling everything from clothes to accessories to furniture and equipment as the Irvine-based retailer gets ready to close its stores and website.
Boston-based Gordon Brothers and Chicago-based Hilco Merchant Resources in a statement said it has begun store closures at 137 stores. While Wet Seal lists 171 stores on its website, it’s likely the struggling company has not updated its information in recent months.
Locally, the retailer has stores in Brea, Irvine, Orange and Santa Ana.
Sales will run while inventory lasts. Customers will find 40 percent to 60 percent off items, according to Gordon Brothers and Hilco.
Wet Seal was founded 1962 as Lorne’s and was incorporated as Wet Seal in 1990.
During the heyday of surf-inspired teen fashion, Wet Seal expanded, acquiring roughly 200 Contempo Casuals stores in 1995 from the Neiman Marcus Group. It also developed Arden B, a fashion brand aimed at women in their 20s and 30s. All 54 Arden B stores closed in mid-2014. The stores were then converted to Wet Seal Plus or Wet Seal stores.
The brand has been on an extended decline. In 2013, then based in Foothill Ranch, the company lost $113 million. In the 18 months before its first bankruptcy in 2015, Wet Seal lost 99 percent of its value.
Shortly before filing for Chapter 11 in 2015, the company closed 338 stores, or two-thirds of its U.S. locations and laid off 3,700 employees after a default notice was filed by creditor Hudson Bay Master Fund for around $29 million.
Versa Capital Management bought the retailer that April for $7.5 million in cash and $20 million debtor-in-possession financing.
The company shifted to Irvine in 2016.
Contact the writer: hmadans@ocregister.com or Twitter: @HannahMadans
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