Footwear brand Clergerie bought at eleventh hour, employees in the dark about future

French luxury footwear brand Clergerie went into liquidation in early April and has now been bought by Spanish company Petrel 92 SL. But the fate of its 50 employees remains uncertain, to their great dismay, an employee representative told AFP on Wednesday.

Petrel 92 SL made its bid soon after the iconic French brand was formally liquidated on April 8 by the trade court in Romans-sur-Isère, France. The buyer must maintain “all of the employees’ work contracts,” according to a ruling dated April 22 seen by AFP, confirming a report by the Dauphiné Libéré newspaper.

But the majority of the workers’ jobs won’t in fact be retained, said in a conference call Laurent Azoulai, attorney for Joe Ouaknine, CEO of Titan Industries, Clergerie’s previous owner, according to Valérie Treffé-Chavant, a Clergerie employee and a representative of the CFE-CGC union, who attended the meeting.

Azoulai said that the trade court had “incorrectly transcribed” the acquisition bid’s text, and that the buyer only actually intends to keep 14 employees, Treffé-Chavant told AFP.

“A grotesque situation,” according to the employees, most of whom are based in Romans-sur-Isère, where the last remaining factory has now closed. Treffé-Chavant said they have become like “ghosts, as they have no contract, they don’t know whether they have been made redundant or not, and aren’t being paid.”

Azoulai and the court have not yet responded to the AFP’s queries.

Clergerie, in its heyday, used to sell footwear to Hollywood stars, its shoes worn by the likes of Lauren Bacall and Madonna. The brand was one of the last footwear producers to manufacture leather shoes at its own factory in France, like Paraboot, J.M. Weston and Heschung.

Clergerie was founded in 1981 and had been struggling for several years. It went into receivership in 2023, and was then bought by Californian company Titan Footwear, which delocalised part of the manufacturing and cut several jobs.

The three companies running the Clergerie business, JHJ, SSB and Tiger Mode, went into liquidation in April after the court rejected the one acquisition bid made by one of the brand’s shareholders.