The officials of the two parties had not answered ZF’s calls for comment.
“Snack Attack sold the factory to the Czechs because it is going through a rough time financially; if it hadn’t sold, it would have been forced to close,” a market source said.
Another source says that the Czech-held Fresh Crocodile Company only bought the factory, while the 12-restaurant chain has several buyers interested in it. Snack Attack, which went insolvent in 2009 because of a 275,000 lei (EUR62,000) debt to a chicken supplier, invested EUR2.5 million in this production facility.
Snack Attack’s business has been dwindling since the insolvency, halving from 30.64 million lei in 2008 to RON16.18 million last year.
The trouble started in November 2008, once the crisis hit Romania. The company needed a loan for the factory in Balotesti, but the banks turned it down. The shareholders were forced to transfer the cash of the company to the new project. It then started to streamline, closing restaurants and laying off employees. Shortly thereafter the shareholders were notified chicken supplier Convenience Prod had gone to court requesting Snack Attack be declared insolvent on a RON275,000 debt and the court approved its petition.
Its biggest creditors were banks, which had lent it EUR2.2 million. Leasing companies had about EUR600,000 to recoup and suppliers almost half of this amount, according to ZF data. Debt at the end of 2011 stood RON13 million, as shown on the Finance Ministry’s website.
Fresh Crocodile Company was established in the Czech Republic two decades ago and specializes in making and distributing sandwiches in Europe in countries like Czech Republic, Austria, Hungary and Spain. Its products are sold in supermarkets, airports, gas stations and through vending machines.
In Romania, it operates via Constanta-based Rivoli Trade, which posted RON4 million revenue last year. The company owns a sandwich factory in that city, according to the corporate website. (EUR1=RON4.4665)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)