Last orders, please!
November 2, 2009
Following Sunday's last-gasp sale in Quelle's Internet shopping portal, the Nuremberg-based company on Monday launched a final, everything-must-go bankruptcy sale at its 80 appliance and technology stores and 1,200 retail outlets.
Quelle management, or what's left of it, was hoping to unload as many of the approximately 18 million items still stocked in its warehouses.
And the cut-rate goods were going like hotcakes, as thousands of bargain hunters took advantage of the deals to stock up on clothing, white goods and Christmas gifts.
Sunday's online sale chalked up almost 62,000 orders, easily topping the one-day record of 45,900 in the run-up to Christmas 2008. Internet sales were so brisk that the company's servers couldn't handle the demand and crashed.
On Monday, Quelle's online shop had rung up 18,000 sales by seven o'clock in the morning.
The Quelle sell-off will continue until the warehouses are empty, and then, that will be the end of the 82-year-history of what was once Europe's largest mail order house.
gb/dpa/AP/Reuters
Editor: Jennifer Abramsohn