Frasers Group saved 48 jobs when it acquired Ebuyer from administration last month, an administrator’s report has revealed.
The Sports Direct owner snapped up the fallen e-tailer’s business and assets from administration for £2.07m on 11 August in a pre-packaged sale.
A pre-packaged sale, or ‘pre-pack’, means the sale was arranged before the appointment of an administrator, but performed at the roughly same time.
Ebuyer went into administration owing trade creditors £33.3m, with distributors Westcoast, TD Synnex and Exertis all in for more than £2m, according to a Statement of Administrator’s Proposal filed last week on Companies House.
In an interview last April with IT Channel Oxygen, Ebuyer CEO Richard Marsden acknowledged that he and his a business partner Mark Reed’s first 365 days helming the e-tailer had been “more of a transformation than we originally anticipated”.
Ebuyer’s trading was impacted by a “combination of factors”, including a 20% year-on-year market contraction, the Statement of Proposal said.
Ranking 32nd in Oxygen 250 2025, Ebuyer’s calendar 2023 revenues fell 22% to £136.5m, with net losses reaching £1.7m.
“The withdrawal of credit insurance across the sector further constrained working capital flexibility, leading to increased cost of goods sold and compressed gross margins, resulting in an EBITDA loss of £4m in 2025,” the administrator’s report added.
Sporting chance
Ebuyer’s business and assets were acquired by Ebyr (Investco) Limited, which is owned by Sportsdirect.Com Retail Limited.
The transaction was deemed a connected party sale because both Marsden and fellow Ebuyer Director Alison Rose are involved in Ebyr (Investco) Limited’s management.
Some 48 employees were transferred to the purchaser under TUPE, with the remaining circa 84 employees either made, or to be made, redundant, the report stated.
FRP was formally engaged on 29 July 2025 to conduct a pre-pack sale after attempts to sell the e-tailer as a going concern failed (despite it receiving four non-binding offers).
FRP said a pre-pack sale would result in a “significantly higher return to creditors” compared to a shut-down scenario.
According to the report, Westcoast was owed around £5.2m, Exertis UK £2.5m and TD Synnex £2m, with Spire (£755,000), CMS (£572,000) and Midwich (£279,000) among the other substantial distributor creditors.
Ebuyer’s collapse follows the administration of fellow e-tailer Box Ltd last year.
One distribution source, who wished to remain anonymous, said his company had been “diligent and cautious” about extending credit to anyone outside the “best backed” retailers for “quite a few years now”.
“Consumer product focused e-tailers are constantly kept under review unless we are sure of their backing and ideally have a direct connection to their backers,” they said.
Ben Jackson, CEO of distributor Titan Data Solutions said he has “a lot of love and respect” for Marsden and “feels genuine sympathy for him”.
“He had the best of intentions and aspirations for Ebuyer, it’s just a shame the market conditions were against him,” Jackson said.
Frasers Group declined to comment further.
