More than £40,000 has been raised to help 73 staff made redundant after music magazine publisher Team Rock announced it was going into administration today.
Staff have been sent home with no pay for this month, just days before Christmas.
Management of the company transferred to administrators FRP Advisory as of yesterday while a buyer for its Classic Rock, Metal Hammer and Prog magazine titles is sought.
The Just Giving page, which says it aims to raise £20,000 “to help the staff of Team Rock”, claims staff have been laid off “with no pay” just days before Christmas.
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Out of a total of 80 staff employed by Team Rock, 27 based at its UK headquarters in High Blantyre, Glasgow, and 46 in London have lost their jobs
A further seven have been retained “in the short term” to assist administrators with “magazine publishing, website maintenance and other matters”.
Asked if the claims of being laid off with no pay, a spokesperson for the administrators told Press Gazette: “All staff had been paid up to the end of November.
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“We have provided the information to employees to make claims to the Insolvency Service for arrears of pay, payment in lieu of notice of redundancy, and holiday pay.
“Claims are made online directly by the employee and are capped at £479 per week and it can take three to six weeks for claims to be processed, so it will be late January before employees receive payments for December wages directly from the Insolvency Service”.
Administrators said the Team Rock website would be “unavailable for the foreseeable future” and that they would be “assessing the position regarding publication of magazines”.
Team Rock had been making an annual turnover of more than £6m, but a statement from the administrators revealed the company had traded at a loss “for a significant period of time”.
They said: “Cost-cutting measures were implemented and despite the best efforts of the directors to seek additional investment or a purchaser for the business, no deal could be completed, leaving the Company with no viable option other than to enter administration and to immediately cease trading.”
Joint administrator Tom MacLennan said the administration presented an “excellent opportunity to acquire high profile rock music titles, products and brands that have a substantial global following”.
“The brands and assets could appeal to a music publishing business looking to expand its portfolio, or an entrepreneur that sees the potential for developing the brands,” he said.
MacLennan added: “Our priority is to work closely with all agencies and services to ensure employees receive every support and assistance at this very difficult time.”
Team Rock’s website, teamrock.com, was said to have been attracting in excess of three million hits per month and the company also had a “large audience” for its radio channel, Team Rock.
Team Rock was founded in 2012 and a year later expanded to acquire the Classic Rock, Prog and Metal Hammer titles from Future Publishing.
Classic Rock had a monthly circulation of 50,219 a month the last time it was audited by ABC in 2015 and Metal Hammer stood at 20,961.
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