Less than a month after entering into voluntary administration, the Beville family has announced that its bid to “to reacquire the business and retain the 80-year old Bevilles brand” has been successful.
Bevilles Corp will retain 16 stores and 250 staff across three states. Bevilles Corp CEO Michelle Beville said she was extremely pleased that the family’s bid to retain the business had been successful.
“I would like to say a big thank you to everyone who has supported us throughout the process, including my family, our tremendous staff and loyal customers,” she said.
The company’s new structure “supports Bevilles’ move to smaller, smarter, new-look, jewellery-only format stores which will focus on diamonds and a range of watches and be approximately half the size of previous stores”. It will also see the implementation of systems and processes to streamline operations, improve efficiencies and reduce costs.
“The pilot program in Liverpool (NSW) and Highpoint (Vic) proves that the smaller, smarter, new-look, jewellery-only format is the right strategy for the brand to move forward with,” she said.
“The 16 stores that have been retained are best suited to this successful new format.” She concluded that “while this is a positive outcome for the brand, there are a number of people that will no longer be with us”. “We wish them all the best as they too have been a big part of the Bevilles brand.”
Michelle Beville’s grandparents’ Leo and Rae Beville founded Bevilles in 1934 with a store in Melbourne’s Bourke Street Mall. The store featured homewares but expanded to include jewellery and diamonds in the late 1950s and then gradually grew into a chain of stores across NSW, Victoria and South Australia.
At the time of going into administration Bevilles had 27 stores.