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Nicholas Lovell
Home   >   Game Over Zone   >   Zavvi goes bust

Zavvi goes bust

By on December 24, 2008

On Christmas Eve, when entertainment retailers should be raking it in, Zavvi has entered administration, putting 3,400 jobs at risk.

The proximate cause is the collapse of EUK. Zavvi is believed to have owed the distributor (owned by Woolworths) over £100 million. Woolworth’s administrators needed to reclaim this money, which may have put unsustainable pressure on Zavvi. The company is still trading, and has not yet moved to the GameOverZone, but is on the watch list.

So Pinnacle and EUK have gone on the distribution side, while Woolworth’s and Zavvi are no longer going to be selling games. Elsewhere in the High Street, Whittard’s of Chelsea and The Officer’s Club appear to have collapsed too.

And most commentators seem to think that many businesses are holding off bad news until the New Year to avoid ruining people’s Christmases.

It’s going to get worse in January and February. Much worse.

About Nicholas Lovell

Nicholas is the founder of Gamesbrief, a blog dedicated to the business of games. It aims to be informative, authoritative and above all helpful to developers grappling with business strategy. He is the author of a growing list of books about making money in the games industry and other digital media, including How to Publish a Game and Design Rules for Free-to-Play Games, and Penguin-published title The Curve: thecurveonline.com