Bankrupt Blokker sells 202 sea containers with items to a trader

Blokker sells off a large part of its stock in one fell swoop. Lot dealer Kooistra.com from Leeuwarden takes over 202 sea containers full of items from the bankrupt retail chain.

Some of the containers are still in the port and some are still at sea, says Kooistra.com’s lawyer. This concerns supplies that were already purchased before the bankruptcy and that have not yet been paid for.

According to Kooistra’s lawyer, this concerns 10,000 pallets with 16,000 different household items. One of these days the items will be transported from the port of Rotterdam to storage in Leeuwarden.

In November, Blokker was declared bankrupt. The company’s debts to a lender, the tax authorities and suppliers had risen too far. The turnover of the stores was also disappointing.

The store chain is conducting a clearance sale that will last until the end of the year. The shelves in the branches are now becoming empty. As of December 21, at the end of next week, 100 stores will close prematurely. Their staff will work in the stores that are still open.

It is not known how much Kooistra.com pays for the stock. The first 35 million euros that the trustee manages to extract from Blokker will go to the American investment company Gordon Brothers, which has priority over other major creditors, such as the Tax Authorities, due to a pledge.

The owner of the company that bought Blokker’s stuff is Eric Kooistra. He is the third generation of the family behind the trading company and a cousin of Jerke Kooistra, an entrepreneur who took over Big Bazar from Blokker in 2021. That chain also ran into major financial problems, and went bankrupt last year.

It is still not clear whether there will be a restart for Blokker.