Bournemouth: Apple Home Improvements goes into liquidation

Simon Campbell and Andrew Watling, insolvency practitioners at business advisory firm Quantuma, have been instructed to handle the liquidation of Apple Panels, trading as Apple Home Improvements.

Based in Bournemouth, Apple Home Improvements provides a product range of windows, doors and conservatories. Founded in 2000, the company has showrooms in Bournemouth, West Parley, Southampton and Weymouth, and had a turnover of £11 million.

The Quantuma team has been brought in to advise the company, after it experienced significant cashflow difficulties, leaving it unable to pay employees’, sub-contractors and trade creditors. As a result, the company will be placed into liquidation early in the new year.

Simon Campbell, a director at Quantuma, commented: “This long-standing local business appears to have been brought down by a combination of events, including: substantial cross-guarantees from the historic failure of an associated solar panel business, design-fault issues with some types of fabricated roofs and difficulties with accessing working capital from financiers in a timely manner.  

“We are working with the business to try to construct a deal with a third party to ensure that work-in-progress is completed, and disruption and loss to customers is minimised. This is obviously terrible news for employees and sub-contractors, particularly at this time of year, however it was clear that the company had no choice but to take this decision given its inability to trade forward without further losses.”