DAVID JONES COLLAPSES INTO ADMINISTRATION AFTER LANDLORD TALKS FAIL

David Jones, Australia's oldest department store chain at 188 years old and known locally as DJs, has gone into voluntary administration. The boards of David Jones and its owner, Anchorage Capital Partners, placed the retailer into administration on 5 November after talks with landlords broke down, with McGrathNicol appointed as administrator and FTI Consulting as receivers. David Jones employs about 6,000 staff across 38 stores, which will keep trading, along with its online store, while the company is reviewed. Thousands of jobs are at risk.

Scentre Group, which owns the Westfield centres and is David Jones's biggest landlord with 17 of its 38 stores, said the retailer was in breach of its tenancy agreement over unpaid rent. Its chief executive, Elliott Rusanow, said on 4 November that rent had gone unpaid; accounts differ on whether payments stopped in September or October. Anchorage Capital Partners bought David Jones for $100 million in 2023, far less than the $2.1 billion Woolworths Holdings paid for it in 2014. Rival Myer reported in September a loss of $276 million for the 2026 financial year, its second-worst result in more than a century.

David Jones chief executive Erica Berthold called the company "iconic" and said it has a "well-developed plan" to "reset the business for the future." Christopher Hill of FTI Consulting said "rising costs, a significant and outdated retail footprint, and supply chain challenges" led to the collapse, and that administration would give David Jones "breathing space" to restructure. Jana Bowden, who teaches marketing at Macquarie University's Business School, said the collapse signalled the "death knell" for the department store format. For many Australians, the retailer's black-and-white houndstooth design had represented luxury.