4 ms·
> Company executives and industry analysts blamed a series of factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic, escalating theft and crime, competition, big increases i
by alright2565 3y ago
> Company executives and industry analysts blamed a series of factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic, escalating theft and crime, competition, big increases in operating costs stemming from high inflation and the expense of servicing its debt … significant minimum-wage jumps.
But you keep reading just a little bit, and you find out this company is a victim of a leveraged buyout:
> The family management team … departing in 2013 The deal — which valued 99 Cents Only Stores at $1.6 billion — saddled the company with a debt load that turned a “conservative balance sheet” into a “highly leveraged capital structure,”
This is absolutely shameless. The owners put the company on incredibly shaky footing, then when a bump in the road comes up, they use it to do politics and refuse to take responsibility?
- extraduder_ire 3y agoIs there any way to look out for businesses that have this done to them? I only ever hear about it when the company that's getting hollowed out runs into trouble some months or years later. I know such buyouts don't always crater the target company in the short term, but it would be nice to have a directory of zombified businesses somewhere so one knows to steer their investment and custom elsewhere.
- flandish 3y ago>do politics and refuse to take responsibility This is just normal capitalist logic. This is how all corporations would do it if able. See also: 2008’s banking “crisis” among others. None of this is a surprise and pretending it is just enables others to do the same; all while harming the working class and local communities in the name of financial safety for the owners.