• Financing has been provided by Banco Santander, the Official Credit Institute (ICO), BBVA, CaixaBank, Société Générale, Bankia, Banco Sabadell and Crédit Agricole, and will help to protect the liquidity of the Group and provide a larger safety net for the management of the business within the context of Covid-19.
• In February Tendam closed its financial year in a solid financial position, with its lowest level of borrowing in 15 years.
• If the current situation continues as expected, this week the company will have almost 300 stores open worldwide.

Tendam, one of Europe’s leading fashion retailers operating in the specialised chain store segment through the Cortefiel, Pedro del Hierro, Springfield, Women’secret and Fifty brands, has announced today that it has signed a credit facility for a total of €132.5 million. This arrangement consists of a €122.5 million syndicated loan plus a further €10 million bilateral credit agreement. The institutions lending are Banco Santander, the Official Credit Institute of Spain (ICO), BBVA, CaixaBank, Société Générale, Bankia, Banco Sabadell and Crédit Agricole.

At the end of February – coinciding with end of the Group’s financial year 2019/20 – Tendam was in a solid financial position, with the lowest debt in 15 years. Even with all its stores closed for two months, the company has made up the difference in salary for all its furloughed staff in March and April, as well as granting almost 2,000 zero-interest loans to employees, to provide for possible delays in payments from the State Employment Service (SEPE).

During this period, Tendam and its brands, as active and responsible members of society, initiated the campaign #TodosSumamos-El hilo que nos une (“#AllTogether-the thread that unites us”), under which they provided over 50,000 items of clothing to 300 medical institutions throughout Spain. To date, the combined value of these donations is €1 million. The Group has also used its distribution network to process the purchase of a million euro’s worth of personal protection equipment both for Tendam and other businesses such as Openbank and CLH, as well as helping to make over 2,000 protective gowns and 7,000 face masks.

Chairman and CEO, Jaume Miquel, stated: “We entered this unprecedented crisis with a solid financial position, which has allowed us to provide firm support for all our partners during this particularly difficult time as well as providing support through charity. This additional credit confirms the trust that financial institutions have in Tendam and protect the business activity from the negative impact caused by Covid- 19.”

Since 4 May, Tendam has reopened 100 of its own stores and franchises and, from today (11 May) a further 200 stores in Spain, Portugal, France and Belgium are open for business.

The online business has seen its sales more than double after an initial slowdown during the first few weeks of lockdown, followed by an increase of over 30% in April.