Circuit City seeks to retain execs as it winds down

Posted Feb 13th 2009 10:15AM by Brian White
Filed under: Bad News, Industry

Circuit City Stores Inc. needs to entice some workers, managers and executives to stay with the company until it has completely liquidated all of its assets. In fact, the company this week asked a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge to provide incentives to retain those exact folks -- for at least a little while. Would this matter? You decide.

The about-to-close retailer said that mass defections in its workforce could threaten its plan to wind down its entire nationwide operations in good order along with trying to "maximize value for their estates and stakeholders." Wow -- whatever value there was in the last few months has evaporated in a large way anyway, from a market perspective.

Circuit City is expected to complete current liquidation sales at stores and close up shop for good come the end of March. There is some staff at its corporate Richmond, Va. offices as well until that time. The retailer has proposed that 16 executives would split up a $2.3 million honey pot if these specific objectives were met over the course of the next five weeks or so: 1) staying within the wind-down budget and 2) finding a buyer for Circuit City's Canadian and Internet assets. Outside of the executive comp plan, the remaining non-managerial workers in corporate offices and store locations would share a pot of up to $1.62 million.

Tags: CC, Cicruic city bankruptcy, CicruicCityBankruptcy, Circuit City, CircuitCity

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

2-13-2009 @ 11:55AM

BHarrison said...

Why not "reverse" the requested allocations. Split $1.62 Million amonst the Execs; and $2.3 Million amongst the workers.

And WHY are there any "needed incentives" to retain ANY of these people . . . their alternative is to join the ranks of the unemployed, isn't it?

Wasn't all of the inventory SOLD to liquidators anyway? And the liquidators are using the outlets to sell the inventory (and certainly NOT at "liquidation prices" as has been reported several times.

If the liquidators bought the inventory, then let them handle the selling of the merchandise. Meanwhile, any other monies should be paid to the creditors of Circuit City.