Kitchen firm owes over £800,000 after its collapse
THE huge debts built up by a stricken Derbyshire kitchen firm have been laid bare.
Sonna Kitchens, based in Belper, seemingly disappeared in october after cancelling installations and sacking staff, and leaving customers out of pocket, including a couple from Burton who say they spent £29,000 on a kitchen that was never installed.
Documents reveal the firm owed upwards of £800,000 to customers, workers, contractors, suppliers, the taxman and lenders when it ceased trading and directors Sonny and Anna Shacklock could not be found. The figure was revealed in a statement of affairs sent to parties involved by liquidators Simply Corporate.
The sum is a calculation from debts owed to more than 50 people and companies. It comes after Derbyshire live revealed the full story of Sonna Kitchens’ demise according to a letter from Mr Shacklock sent to creditors earlier this month.
In total, creditors’ claims amount to some £829,258.72, including £13,017 owed to four employees.
The largest single debt is to supplier life Kitchens for living, in Newton Aycliffe, which is owed £91,378.72. His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs is owed more than £47,000. Also listed among the claimants is business loan firm BCRS, which is owed £135,000.
Nineteen customers are owed a total of £348,608.37, including one who paid out £51,866.05 to Sonna.
Numerous small Derbyshire businesses are owed money, including loscoe Electrical; High Edge plumbing, in Nether Heage; JT Joinery, in Ashbourne; Better Flooring, in Ripley; Ryan Brothers, in Belper; Milner Commercial, and Innes England.
Among those owed many thousands of pounds include Corin Campbell and her partner Nathan Hill, from Burton, who spent £29,000 on a kitchen that was never installed.
As reported in the Burton Mail on November 1, Ms Campbell, 33, a designer of underwear and nightwear, and her carpet fitter partner Nathan Hill, 33, moved into a new home in Burton last year and decided they wanted a new kitchen. They approached Sonna Kitchens, deciding to order one of their highend 1909 ranges.
The full fee was paid prior to its installation, that was supposed to begin on November 1.
Ms Campbell told the Mail: “It was a proper shaker style kitchen, so it’s not cheap and not your normal Wickes kitchen. We ordered it six weeks ago and paid in full.
“It was supposed to be delivered four weeks ago, but we found out on october 17 that he never ordered the kitchen. Now he’s saying he’s gone into liquidation.
“It’s disgusting really, six or seven weeks ago he should have ordered our kitchen, I don’t really know what’s going on.”
other people owed money include:
Eleanor and Bob plant, from Belper, paid £20,000 for a kitchen that was never installed.
Sam Martin and Danielle Charlton paid £15,000 of their savings for a kitchen from Sonna that was never installed.
Handyman Karl Swann says he is owed around £2,500 for work he completed for Sonna Kitchens.
The Thoude family, from oakwood, were left with an unfinished
kitchen after spending £17,000.
The notice to creditors tells a tale of a company formed in 2019 that expanded quickly with turnover reaching £1.2 million at its height before its demise, leaving customers and creditors high and dry.
In July this year, they began to encounter serious problems as orders started to dry up amid the emerging cost-of-living crisis.
The letter from Mr Shacklock says: “The economic climate had changed in the uk in the months preceding July, including with the cost-of-living crisis, and customer enquiries from May 2022 had sharply declined. Turnover in June and July 2022 was 30% of that which it had been in the previous 19 months.”
The letter admits the company was using money coming in from customers in order to pay off other debts and to make purchases to complete earlier orders.
By August and September, the letter says, the company was only making 4% of sales that it had previously been making. In early September the company was still trying to complete customer installations with any money or credit they had left.
Turnover was so low that staff did not work in october, says the report.
Sonna Kitchens stopped trading on october 13 this year, says the letter to creditors.
A creditor meeting is to be held today at 1.15pm.