Overview
VWCC Limited, trading as Vintage Wholesale Clothing, is a vintage clothing business in Kingston upon Hull which sells wholesale stock to retailers and trade buyers. It is best known for WornWell, its pre-loved clothing shops inside a national retailer across the UK and Ireland.
However, the retailer withdrew the concession space in September 2025, which left the company with the costs of the expansion and no way of covering them. Because of this, and certain other difficulties, it entered a Company Voluntary Arrangement in April 2026, but the monthly payments were found to be unaffordable. Accordingly, the arrangement was destined to fail at an early stage.
David Kemp of Exigen Group was appointed Joint Administrator in August 2026, and the business and assets were sold afterwards, saving the business and all of the jobs.
The Background
The company was set up in May 2014 selling vintage clothing online one item at a time. It moved into wholesale after finding that selling stock in bulk sold faster and took far less work, and by May 2019 turnover had passed £1.5 million.
That same month a director at the retailer got in touch to ask whether vintage clothing could be sold in their stores. The two sides agreed on a model where the company would fit out the space inside the stores, supply the stock and run the sales itself.
The first WornWell shop opened in Birmingham in September 2022 and sold well. Another nine followed within a year, including two in Ireland, and the company went from around five staff to roughly 115 people. Each shop cost around £50,000 to fit out and the company paid for all of them.
When WornWell were asked to expand into twenty more shops in 2024, the directors said no and chose to consolidate instead, worried that growing that fast would put too much pressure on the business.
The Challenges
Trading got harder through 2023 and into 2024 as wage costs, tax and PAYE bills all increased, as well as the cost-of-living crisis affecting the public’s spending. The company was also losing a lot of stock in some shops due to shoplifting, particularly their higher value branded items.
The company closed its weakest shops and moved one of its strongest to a wholesale arrangement, where the retailer ran the concession and the company supplied the stock. That cut costs, but it also cut a large part of the retail income.
Things changed again in March 2025 when there were head office changes at the retailer, and they decided to take the business into a new direction. WornWell no longer fitted into these plans, and in September 2025 they were given around three weeks to leave its flagship Oxford Street shop and the whole project was cancelled.
The directors took advice and the company entered a CVA in April 2026, paying £35,000 a month for 39 months. Although the cash flow forecasts behind the proposal said the company could afford it, it ultimately struggled and just about managed the first payment, but the second could not be met.
The Outcome of the VWCC Limited Administration
Following an internal introduction from our sister company Touch Financial, the directors spoke to David Kemp about their options as it was clear they couldn’t keep up with the monthly payments for the CVA.
David spoke to the director and his adviser together to explain how an administration and sale would work and why it looked to be a better outcome than closing the company.
Once the directors decided to go ahead, the business was valued and marketed, terms were agreed, and the business and assets were sold immediately after the appointment in August 2026, around four months after the CVA started. The jobs were saved and the business is still trading.
David Kemp, Administrator at Exigen Group, said:
“The directors worked incredibly hard to build this business and it grew very quickly, but it is an example of what can happen to a business that relies on one main customer when that relationship ends.“A lot of directors take on that risk without really seeing it as one, because a big name customer can feel safe. It is worth really planning for what could happen if that customer relationship ends, and whether the business could carry the cost of the growth it has taken on to work with them.
“Although the CVA was worth trying, the payment amounts were based on trading numbers the company could no longer reach once the relationship with the retailer ended. Any arrangement has to match the position the business is actually in, and that is why we always say take advice early, because there are far more options while there is still time to work with.”