Sternenbäck Group rescued with support from Ebner Stolz

• 254-year-old tra­di­tio­nal com­pany de­fies corona loads
• 170 bake­ries and th­ree pro­duc­tion sites of the tra­di­tio­nal com­pany se­cu­red - 1,400 jobs sa­ved
• Cre­di­tors have over­whel­min­gly ap­pro­ved the in­sol­vency plans de­ve­lo­ped by Eb­ner Stolz

Stutt­gart, No­vem­ber 27, 2020 - The 254-year-old tra­di­tio­nal com­pany Ster­nenbäck re­cor­ded a con­sis­tently po­si­tive busi­ness de­ve­lop­ment un­til the be­gin­ning of the corona pan­de­mic in March 2020. Howe­ver, due to the lock-down in spring, there was a dra­ma­tic drop in sa­les, which made it ne­cessary to in­itiate a pro­tec­tive shiel­ding pro­ce­dure. With the sup­port of a team of con­sul­tants from Eb­ner Stolz, this was con­ver­ted into a self-ad­mi­nis­tra­tion pro­ce­dure as plan­ned on Sep­tem­ber 1, 2020. On No­vem­ber 25, 2020, the cre­di­tors over­whel­min­gly ac­cep­ted the in­sol­vency plans for the Ster­nenbäck Group. The com­pany could thus be sa­ved.

Up to the be­gin­ning of the Corona pan­de­mic in March 2020, the com­pany re­cor­ded con­sis­tently po­si­tive busi­ness de­ve­lop­ment with its 215 bak­ery bran­ches in six fe­deral sta­tes and th­ree bak­ery ope­ra­ti­ons in Hechin­gen, Gera and Sprem­berg (Ger­many). Sa­les and earnings in 2019 and at the be­gin­ning of 2020 were well above ex­pec­ta­ti­ons.

The cur­tail­ment of exit from the mar­ket and the clo­sure of shop­ping cen­ters and the food ser­vice sec­tor from March 2020 on­wards due to the corona pan­de­mic led to a dra­ma­tic down­turn in sa­les, which could not be off­set by the tra­di­tio­nal bak­ery busi­ness. With a view to the fu­ture, the pro­tec­tive shiel­ding pro­ce­dure was in­itia­ted on May 25, 2020, fol­lo­wing the ex­ami­na­tion of al­ter­na­tive so­lu­ti­ons with the sup­port of a team of con­sul­tants from Eb­ner Stolz, and was trans­fer­red to a self-ad­mi­nis­tra­tion pro­ce­dure as plan­ned on Sep­tem­ber 1, 2020.

In the course of these pro­cee­dings, which were ac­com­pa­nied by the chief re­pre­sen­ta­tive Jan Hen­drik Groß (Eb­ner Stolz) and su­per­vi­sed by the trus­tee Prof. Dr. Mar­tin Hörmann (an­chor Rechts­anwälte), a team of ad­vi­sors from Eb­ner Stolz de­ve­lo­ped a re­struc­tu­ring plan that was con­clu­sive and fu­ture-ori­en­ted for the pe­riod af­ter the Corona cri­sis. "Due to our re­struc­tu­ring mea­su­res we were able to achieve a se­rious re­duc­tion of the cost struc­ture as well as a qua­li­ta­tive and sa­les re­ori­en­ta­tion of the ent­ire Ster­nenbäck Group", Prof. Dr. Heiko Au­renz (Eb­ner Stolz) ex­plains the re­struc­tu­ring mea­su­res ta­ken. De­spite the mas­sive im­pact of the Corona pan­de­mic, the ap­pro­ved re­struc­tu­ring plan has se­cu­red the con­ti­nued exis­tence of the tra­di­tio­nal com­pany with 1,400 em­ployees in 170 bak­ery bran­ches and the th­ree pro­duc­tion sites.

On No­vem­ber 25, 2020, the cre­di­tors over­whel­min­gly ap­pro­ved the in­sol­vency plans for each of the four com­pa­nies. As a re­sult, the self-ad­mi­nis­tra­tion pro­cee­dings of the Ster­nenbäck Group (Bumüller GmbH & Co. Back­be­triebe KG, Ster­nenbäck GmbH, Ster­nenbäck GmbH Gera and Ster­nenbäck GmbH Sprem­berg) can be re­scin­ded by the Hechin­gen District Court in the near fu­ture.

"Thanks to the con­sis­tent im­ple­men­ta­tion of the ne­cessary mea­su­res and the sup­port of banks, land­lords, suppliers and cu­st­omers, as well as the loy­alty of its em­ployees - even af­ter the cur­rent lock­down - the Group is well and com­pe­ti­tively po­si­tio­ned for the fu­ture. Above all, howe­ver, the fact that the cri­sis si­gnals were re­co­gnized early on and re­me­dial mea­su­res were ta­ken was what ul­ti­mately sa­ved the com­pany," com­ments the Chief Re­pre­sen­ta­tive Jan Groß on the po­si­tive out­come of the pro­cee­dings.

Team Eb­ner Stolz:
Jan Hen­drik Groß (la­wyer and part­ner, chief re­pre­sen­ta­tive), Lutz Masch­lanka (la­wyer, tax con­sul­tant and se­nior as­so­ciate), Ca­ro­lin Jung­claus (la­wyer and as­so­ciate), Fre­de­rick Kar­nath (la­wyer, tax con­sul­tant and se­nior ma­na­ger), Kon­rad Her­holz (se­nior con­sul­tant), Eva Naumer (la­wyer and se­nior as­so­ciate), Dr. Han­nah Krings (At­tor­ney at Law, Spe­cia­list in La­bor Law and Coun­sel), Sabrina Giers­berg (At­tor­ney at Law and As­so­ciate, both La­bor Law), Dr. Hanno Rädlein (At­tor­ney at Law and Coun­sel)

Team Eb­ner Stolz Ma­nage­ment Con­sul­tants:
Prof. Dr. Heiko Au­renz (gra­duate eco­no­mist and part­ner), Chris­toph Lang (ma­nage­ment con­sul­tant and prin­ci­pal), Chris­toph Sohn (ma­na­ger), Jus­tin Be­cker (con­sul­tant), Dr. Ste­fan On­ken (con­sul­tant), Ma­xi­mi­lian Lachnit (ma­na­ger), Mi­chael Eu­ch­ner (gra­duate la­wyer and part­ner) and Ju­lia Jau­mann (ma­na­ger, both M&A)

Team an­chor At­tor­neys at Law (ad­mi­nis­tra­tion):
Prof. Dr. Mar­tin Hörmann (At­tor­ney and Part­ner, Ad­mi­nis­tra­tor), Na­dine Mayer (Busi­ness La­wyer, LL.M.)

Press contact

Dr. Ul­rike Höreth
Eb­ner Stolz
Kro­nen­straße 30
70174 Stutt­gart
Tel.  +49 711 2049-1371
ul­rike.hoe­re­th@eb­ner­stolz.de

Corporate contact

Jan Hen­drik Groß
Eb­ner Stolz
Holz­markt 1
50676 Köln
Tel. +49 221 20643-615
jan.gros­s@eb­ner­stolz.de

About Ebner Stolz

Eb­ner Stolz is one of the lar­gest inde­pen­dent me­dium-si­zed audi­ting and con­sul­ting com­pa­nies in Ger­many and is one of the top ten in the indu­s­try. The com­pany has deca­des of sound expe­ri­ence in audi­ting, tax con­sul­tancy, le­gal ad­vice and mana­ge­ment con­sul­tancy. This broad spec­trum is ser­viced by more than 1,700 emp­loyees with their mul­ti­di­s­ci­p­li­nary ap­proach in all ma­jor Ger­man ci­ties and eco­no­mic cen­t­res. As a mar­ket lea­der in the SME sec­tor, the com­pany mainly ser­ves me­dium-si­zed indu­s­trial, trade and ser­vice com­pa­nies be­lon­ging to all sec­tors and si­zes.

Eb­ner Stolz car­ries out in­ter­na­tio­nal au­dit and con­sul­ting as­sign­ments toge­ther with part­ners of Ne­xia In­ter­na­tio­nal, one of the ten lar­gest net­works of audi­ting and con­sul­ting com­pa­nies world­wide. Th­rough Ne­xia, Eb­ner Stolz is rep­re­sen­ted in over 120 coun­tries with more than 720 of­fices.