City Convenience Leasing Pty Ltd was placed into liquidation on October 11, 2016, ASIC records reveal.
This follows an application made by the ATO to the Federal Court to wind up City Convenience Store Pty Ltd.
The application against City Convenience Store Pty Ltd was made by the Deputy Commissioner of Taxation on September 22, 2016, with a hearing in NSW Federal Court slated for later this month on October 28.
At this stage it is unclear what impact the liquidation of City Convenience Leasing Pty Ltd will have upon the City Convenience store chain.
Suelen McCallum of insolvency specialists deVries Tayeh told C&I Media that at this stage it was unclear how the liquidation of City Convenience Leasing Pty Ltd would impact the operation of the City Convenience stores.
Ms McCallum said, “We’ve only just been appointed, and are in the middle of our investigations. We haven’t met with directors as yet, so we don’t know the full position of the company, and we are unable to comment on whether the liquidation will directly affect the operations of the stores”.
City Convenience was started by Jamal Gebara, who dubs himself as ‘The King of Convenience’ on the company’s website, in 1996 with a single store in Bondi, Sydney.
It is understood that at its peak City Convenience operated more than 180 stores nationwide.
According to its website, the City Convenience Group operates three categories of stores – the traditional outlet; ‘City Convenience Store’, a specialty outlet primarily located in hotel lobbies; ‘City Essentials’ and more recently a boutique supermarket outlet; ‘City Supermarkets’.
In November 2015 the company unveiled a new store fitout on its Facebook page, which has been inactive since January this year when it celebrated its 20th anniversary.
C&I Week attempted to contact City Convenience but the phone number listed on its website has been disconnected.
Sign up to C&I’s free bi-weekly newsletter here to receive the latest industry news every Tuesday and Thursday. Follow C&I on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.