Charles Vögele in Austria on the verge of going out of business

Following the Swiss parent company, the Charles Vögele/OVS fashion chain has now also filed for insolvency in Austria at the end of July. According to Austrian media, the company ran into liquidity problems following a nine percent drop in sales last year to 109 million euros and the insolvency of its Swiss parent announced in June; Vögele was no longer able to pay employees' salaries and deferred vacation pay due at the end of the month. According to a report in the "Standard", Charles Vögele is said to be over-indebted by around 20 million euros. 102 stores would be facing closure - 89 of them under the Charles Vögele brand and 13 under OVS.

Due to the legal and economic framework conditions, the management of Charles Vögele (Austria) GmbH now intends to apply for judicial reorganization proceedings and, in parallel, to continue the far advanced negotiations with investors.

In June, Sempione Fashion, which operates the Charles Vögele/OVS stores in Switzerland, had announced the dismissal of all employees for the end of the month. The Charles Vögele successor had already been in debt-restructuring moratorium since the beginning of June. Thomas Krenn, Managing Director of Charles Vögele (Austria), reportedly saw no possibility of continuing the company in its current form.

Like OVS Switzerland, Charles Vögele Austria is a subsidiary of Sempione Fashion AG in Pfäffikon SZ, which filed for insolvency last May. This in turn is a subsidiary of the Italian OVS Group, which had taken over Charles Vögele in 2016 with two partners under the holding name Sempione Retail. In May 2018, OVS abandoned the Swiss market again.