685 Jobs Fall at National Drinks Wholesaler Waverley TBS

Nearly 700 jobs have been lost at one of the UK’s largest national drinks suppliers after administrators were unable to find a buyer for the firm.

Waverley TBS will continue to operate with a reduced workforce of 97. A message on the company website states ‘On 2 October 2012 Daniel Francis Butters and William Kenneth Dawson were appointed Joint Administrators and now manage the affairs, business and property of the Companies in Administration.’

The company had supplied alcoholic beverages and soft drinks to numerous clients across the UK, including Madame Tussauds’ parent company Merlin Entertainments.

In total, 685 redundancies have been made across Waverley TBS offices in Hemel Hempstead, Chesterfield and Felling, near Gateshead.

Like many other firms in the drinks trade, the company has suffered in the last four years from thousands of pub closures, beer duty increases and increased supermarket competition.

Daniel Butters, from administrator Deloitte, said: "Regrettably, despite our continued efforts, we have been unable to identify a suitable buyer for the business. Whilst we will continue to consider offers for the sale of the business as a going concern, we will now focus on realising value from the company's assets.

"We will retain a core team of 97 employees to assist us in realising value from the company's assets. We are extremely grateful to the staff and management for their support throughout this difficult time."

The company had posted a pre-tax profit of £4.2m last year despite a 12% drop in turnover.