The sporting goods retailer Sport-Scheck is taken over by the Italian family business Cisalfa Sport. Cisalfa intends to continue to operate the Sport-Scheck brand as a whole. The company headquarters in Munich will be retained, as will the currently around 30 branches in Germany and the online shop. The Italians want to maintain and further develop the opportunity for customers to shop via multiple channels.
According to its own information, Cisalfa is the largest sporting goods retailer in Italy with 150 stores there. The company specializes in sportswear, shoes and equipment and sells more than 250 brands. He is also already present in Germany through the subsidiary Sport Voswinkel with 50 branches. The takeover of Voswinkel only took place last fall.
Sport-Scheck had to file for bankruptcy in November last year. The chain was caught in the wake of the insolvency of the owner, Signa-Holding, owned by the Austrian entrepreneur René Benko, who only took over Sport-Scheck from the Otto Group in 2019. Shortly before the Signa Holding went bankrupt, there had been negotiations with the British retail group Frasers (Sports Direct). Frasers then announced the takeover in October, but failed to complete it before Signa Holding went bankrupt. With the bankruptcy it became obsolete. A bidding competition began, in which Cisalfa ultimately made the most convincing offer from the perspective of the insolvency administrators and consultants involved.
The official insolvency proceedings only began at the beginning of March. The insolvency administrators from the law firm Müller-Heydenreich Bierbach and the consulting firm Kearney viewed the announcement of the takeover just two weeks later as a success. Cisalfa was able to prevail against a large number of potential international investors, the law firm said. In the end, the Italians were convincing “with the best overall concept”.
Cisalfa wants to establish Sport-Scheck as a premium sports retailer
This means several things: On the one hand, Cisalfa is a family business that Sport-Scheck boss Matthias Rucker described as the strategically “right home” for Sport-Scheck. On the other hand, Cisalfa is a long-term investor and offers “interesting growth opportunities”. Boris Zanoletti, Cisalfa’s general manager, suggested what these could consist of. His company believes it can help Sport-Scheck “consolidate and expand its market position as a premium sports retailer,” he said.
The “overall package” also includes the question of whether suppliers can save costs. All three providers are supplied by the Intersport purchasing group with headquarters in Switzerland. The Dortmund sports retailer Voswinkel was not part of this cooperative association Intersport, but was directly part of the Intersport headquarters in Heilbronn. The retailer, which is primarily represented in North Rhine-Westphalia, went bankrupt in 2019 and in the course of the process reduced the number of its branches to 50 today. The development is no coincidence.
One of the biggest competitors for the long-established sports retailers is the French discount provider Decathlon. With the sometimes significantly lower prices, Decathlon broke the billion in sales for the first time in Germany in 2022. Decathlon now operates more than 80 stores in Germany. To counteract the discounter’s cheaper prices, specialist retailers offer advice, branded goods and a wider range of fashionable products. But what was noticeable recently was that they had to repeatedly run discount campaigns in the past for various reasons. That had an impact on sales. At Sport-Scheck, revenues have continued to fall over the past few years and were most recently at 350 million euros.
This should now change with Cisalfa. The takeover is still subject to approval by the antitrust authorities. If approved, it could be completed on schedule in June. The creditors’ meeting at the Munich district court must vote on the insolvency plan at the end of April. The parties did not provide any information about the details of the agreement.
Sport-Scheck was founded in 1946 by Otto Scheck. The company strives to continue the founder’s innovative and pioneering spirit today. This should also be the case after the takeover by Cisalfa.