John Andrew departs Direct Golf

Direct Golf has been taken over by Sports Direct and John Andrew is no longer involved in the business. This follows news that Direct Golf UK and its parent company, Powerhouse Golf, had been put into administration on October 16 following the discovery of alleged accounting irregularities which meant that the business was insolvent.

Sports Direct, which was was set up by Mike Ashley in 1982 and currently has approximately 420 sports stores in the UK, invested in Powerhouse Golf earlier this year and took a 25 per cent stake in the business for an investment reported to be in the region of £2.25 million.

Andrew fought to remain in control of the company but Sports Direct refused to back his restructuring plan and removed all three directors; Andrew, managing director Neil Bell and procurement director Rob Andrew. Powerhouse Golf reported a 76% loss in profits and sales slid 13 per cent to £21.4m in the year to the end of September 2014. It is also believed that Direct Golf owes significant sums to HM Revenue & Customs, landlords and suppliers.

Under the terms of the administration it is thought that the jobs of the 162 employees of Direct Golf – including a significant number of PGA pros – will be saved.

For more on this story, including a comment from John Andrew, make sure you don’t miss the November issue of GOLF RETAILING magazine. 

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A graduate of Cardiff University’s highly respected post-graduate magazine journalism course, Andy has successfully edited four different publications across the B2B, trade and consumer sectors. He is skilled at all aspects of the magazine process in addition to editing websites and managing social media channels.