We’ll probably never learn the extent of shenanigans when it comes to Party Pieces, the family-run business of Carole and Michael Middleton. For years, we heard about how wealthy and successful Carole and Mike were, how this catalog company selling mid-range party supplies was a “British heritage” brand worth $40 million. We heard repeatedly that Carole and Mike could afford all of these lavish holidays and a London apartment and they could fund Kate’s decade of waitying. I don’t think any of that was true. What I think is that the Middletons were in a financial crisis for years and they bankrupted a mildly successful party-supply business through mismanagement and scams. Well, now we know that the courts had to step in to sell PP for £180,000, and that the Middletons owe creditors a lot of money, money which those creditors will probably never get. They also took £220,000 in pandemic loans, which they still haven’t paid back. Well, now we’re learning more about the extent of the Middletons’ debt.
The party company run by the parents of the Duchess of Cambridge has gone into administration almost £2.6 million in the red. Party Pieces Holdings run by Michael and Carole Middleton owes the taxman £612,685, details published reveal. The company also owes £218,749 to RBS bank for a Coronavirus Business Interruption loan, £456,008 to other creditors and £1.4 million in unsecured loans, a statement published by administrators reveal.
Party Pieces has been sold in part to Teddy Tastic Bear Company Limited for £180,000, the document says, with the firm keeping on 12 employees and remaining at its current base in Ashampstead, Berkshire.
It adds that many owed cash will be out of pocket as a result of the business failure, saying: ‘Based on current estimates, it is uncertain whether there will be funds available to enable a distribution to preferential creditors. It is unlikely there will be funds available to enable a distribution to unsecured creditors.’
The report details how the pandemic began to cause the company problems saying that revenue contracted from £4.5 million to £3.2 million between 2021 and 2022, with the company making a loss of £900,000. It said: ‘Management attributed this to the Covid 19 pandemic resulting in reduced social gatherings and a reduction in discretionary spend due to the cost of living crisis. This caused constraints on the company’s cash flows.’
In early 2023 the CEO resigned and the Middletons and other members of the board tried to shore up the company and find a buyer. But the report said: ‘The company experienced increasing creditor pressure, including threats to present winding up petitions and other legal proceedings.’ In the face of the financial challenges the company approached 175 potential buyers and eventually settled on a deal for £180,000 which was for stock worth £120,000 and £60,000 for intellectual property, computers, contracts and other equipment. All 12 employees will transfer to the new company, the administrator report said.
Someone who understands the British bankruptcy system can probably explain this better than me. But it sounds like the Middletons really are bankrupt and they’re going to screw over their creditors to the tune of £2.6 million? I always assumed that the only reason why Teddy Tastic Bear Company Limited agreed to purchase the insolvent Party Pieces was because the court arranged it so the buyer would not have to take on any of PP’s debt. It looks like that’s the case. It also appears that the buyer not only purchased Party Pieces, but the actual land and buildings housing PP’s operations in Berkshire. That was probably the most valuable part of the purchase. Anyway, it’s just fascinating that Carole and Mike are completely broke-ass and neither of their daughters’ rich husbands stepped in to help out. Curious.
PS… there’s more to this story, which is coming up later today. Please don’t threadjack, it’s worth the wait!
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.
-
- Carole Middleton and Michael Middleton arrives at the state funeral and burial of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth, at Westminster Abbey in London, Britain, September 19, 2022.,Image: 724081127, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: -, Model Release: no, Credit line: Geoff Pugh for the Telegraph / Avalon
-
- Michael Middleton and Carole Middleton The State Funeral of Her Majesty The Queen, Service, West Door, Westminster Abbey, London, UK – 19 Sep 2022,Image: 724158040, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: James Veysey/Shutterstock / Avalon
-
- Carole Middleton The State Funeral of Her Majesty The Queen, Service, West Door, Westminster Abbey, London, UK – 19 Sep 2022,Image: 724158170, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: James Veysey/Shutterstock / Avalon
-
- Carole Middleton The State Funeral of Her Majesty The Queen, Service, West Door, Westminster Abbey, London, UK – 19 Sep 2022,Image: 724158734, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: James Veysey/Shutterstock / Avalon
-
- Michael and Carole Middleton arriving at Westminster Abbey, central London, ahead of the coronation ceremony of King Charles III and Queen Camilla.,Image: 774175111, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: -, Model Release: no, Credit line: Andrew Milligan / Avalon
-
- Carole Middleton arriving at Westminster Abbey, central London, ahead of the coronation ceremony of King Charles III and Queen Camilla.,Image: 774175184, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: -, Model Release: no, Credit line: Andrew Milligan / Avalon
-
- Carole Middleton, Michael Middleton, Pippa Middleton and James Middleton at the Coronation of King Charles III at Westminster Abbey in London, United Kingdom, on 06 May 2023.,Image: 774203418, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: James Veysey/Shutterstock / Avalon
-
- Carole Middleton and Michael Middleton arrive at the Coronation of King Charles III at Westminster Abbey in London, United Kingdom, on 06 May 2023.,Image: 774248529, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: -, Model Release: no, Credit line: Phil Harris / Avalon
If there was ever a hint that kkkhate is on her way out it’s this, although I can see chuckles and her angry boy-husband refusing to bail out the commoners, too, and her not making a fuss because that’s what she does best
Really? Because to me this sounds like a solid reason for her to hold on to her marriage and the PoW title. If William divorces her she might actually have to starts working, considering her parents are now penniless. And in those 10 years as a royal girlfriend we all know how that went.
I meant that the fact that they did not help her family perhaps suggests that Will is thinking of getting rid of her. her motivations are always going to be to hang on for dear life and i can see her letting her family go bankrupt if it meant hanging on to her pretty little do-nothing princess role
Considering her parents are NOW penniless? It sounds like they’ve been penniless or living well beyond their means for decades. It sounds like they’ve always managed to find some person(s) or company to finance their lifestyles for them all this time. I have a feeling that, like Andrew, they’ll be alright on the grift.
I would think it’s just the opposite. If her family is hard up and totally dependent on PW’s potential largesse, that means Kate has to take whatever William hands out. Mistresses that he doesn’t hide? Yep. Being rude and contemptuous in public to her? Definitely. Or at least that his thinking.
Now she does have some power – she is the mother of the heir – and I think all of her public appearances are an effort to remind him that she is the more popular of the two and assert herself.
“Now she does have some power – she is the mother of the heir ”
I don’t think she even has that. That didn’t help Diana. Not to mention the fact that Diana was an aristo from a family actually descended from English monarchs unlike the Windsors at the time. Mrs. Wails doesn’t even have that. Melissa Percy talked about how after her divorce from the van Straubenzee guy, their social set froze her out. Her, the daughter of the holder of one of the oldest most prestigious titles in their whole system was frozen out. Mrs. Wails has zero leverage, unless she is willing to burn the whole thing down, which she’s not because she is too desperate to be part of it.
I don’t think Kate has any power at all, and she has belatedly realised this. A former mistress is now the Queen, after all. And Kate has never had anything like the popularity that Diana did. If they split, the public will accept it.
The power existed only in the time prior to the heirs being born. Once that duty was complete, she is no longer needed.
Kate also doesn’t have the public admiration that Diana had and we saw how easily she was replaced.
Kate has always had to take whatever he dishes out and she seems to gladly do so because she wants to be queen. hence, she’s going to keep her mouth shut as always, even if it means no help for her scheming family. i have no doubt she would pick being queen over making any sort of plea for help for her folks.
Nope, she’s got no power. Like others said, she doesn’t even have any of the advantages that Diana has. I’ve always thought that besides the Gary-shaped elephant in the room, there are likely some interesting stories about her time as a royal that could be used against her. Pre-Meghan, even.
Diana was mother of the heir too but it did not stop the divorce. Kate has no leverage or power. And not nearly as popular as Diana. If William wants to divorce they will divorce.
I think it comes down to the specific NDAs that Kate has signed. As we’ve seen with Harry, in the global internet age, there is the possibility for more power for Khate or at least leverage, than was available to Diana.
If Khate can threaten Baldimort with a tell all interview with Oprah or another foreign media outlet, in which she claims he was physically violent and she is the victim of domestic abuse – that would cause enormous damage to BRF. There is literally no way the BM could block or ignore that as could perhaps have happened decades ago. It would dominate international headlines and social media.
It would be veeeeery difficult for William to recover from that. At the very least, it would turn into a public sh*t fight, presumably with his team then attempting to damage her reputation. It would be a disaster for both of them and the monarchy.
To sum up, I think Khate does have the nuclear option of international media, and it gives her power that wasn’t available to Diana.
Khate may also benefit from virtue politics and being perceived as a perfect victim, to the extent that she has likely stuck to her much touted middle class values, and unlike Diana, has not engaged in extra marital affairs. Zero judgement on Diana, however it will probably give Khate a certain credibility with the British general public which Diana did not have.
Something along the lines of “I dedicated myself to our marriage and the children, and he hit me and had affairs…” would require some first class reputation management expertise to successfully push back against.
Kate would not give an Oprah interview. She wants to be queen very badly and an interview would jeopardize that
Oprah would ask her.why she treated Meghan so badly
J a n e bee. Diana had affairs but after Charles cut her loose. Kate is no heroine here. She may not have had affairs but she treated meghan horribly and was openly confrontational. Kate is no saint. She also has low work numbers and has no initiative to be a halfway decent working royal. Kate does not have leverage here.
@Tessa I also doubt that Khate would pull the trigger on tell all interview, and agree with you 100% that she will hang on for dear life in order to be queen. However, the point stands that she has this as leverage if William tries to go ahead with divorce, and that it gives her some power that wasn’t available to Diana in the pre-social media era of heavily controlled, analog media.
If anything, she needs to hold on as tight as she can or start networking to set up her post royal life. I’m still not 100% they’re divorcing. Theyre separated for sure but they still need each other imo and Kate more so than Will which puts him in an advantageous position he might not have with a wife of better standing.
@S808: you and I think a like because i don’t see them divorcing either. Their current arrangement seems to be working well for them. William gets to do what he wants while is devoted husband, father son persona is fiercely protected and kate gets all the praise and the jewelry and titles.
The only way they’ll ever divorce is if William truly and deeply falls in love with someone and want to make her his wife (and if those feelings are reciprocated). And i just don’t see that happening.
this is so interesting…a couple of million is peanuts to the royals…they can fork over several times that to keep unwholesome Andy out of a lawsuit, but not a tiny bit for keeping the future Queen’s family name clean?
Letting them swing in the wind is deliberate (doesn’t reflect well on them, but no one in the family is sticking up for Kate either which shows how little she got the inner circle on her side); and puts Carole in the position of NEEDING actual money settled on her daughter with a divorce (Kate has a clothing allowance but no real money to help out her parents here). That lump sum will be the fallback for her parents being able to keep an adequate home in their waning years. They will either live with her, or nearby if she is able to create a Melania Trump-like contracted marriage. Anyway, at this age, the Middletons are not staging some comeback business venture…so they have to look to the shoring up of their retirement years. Tickets to Kate’s Christmas concerts are not going to compensate the coming bills…
My god, the British royals are the cheapest gazillionaires out there…!
Cheapest?! Whatever do you mean? Why they had to do a lot of inane smiling and waving for their money and lifestyle.
It seems that Carole’s only talent was spending vast sums of money, that she did not have, to turn her daughters into honey traps so that they could marry wealthy men. Now that it’s obvious that the cupboard is bare, the wealthy husbands must be embarrassed at being duped and I doubt that they will bail the Middletons out now. If they were willing to help, they would have done it already to spare their wives the humiliation. They called Meghan a gold digger but she brought real wealth, ($5M) into her marriage.
Are we not going to address a major factor in this business failure… the 800lb gorilla, if you will? Uncle Gary?
It’s my belief that Uncle Gary, who runs drugs and young girls on the continent, was using his sister’s venture as a money launder, and CarolE was getting a cut to keep her business afloat and help her afford that lifestyle they were living.
The reason they went from £4.5 million to £3.2 million between 2021 and 2022, is that trafficking girls isn’t really a viable business choice during a pandemic lockdown; and post Continental lockdowns, some people are still being cautious, so “the business” Uncle Gary is engaged in is slow to recover.
I mean they’ll probably blame it on Brexit but the timelines don’t line up.
Well well well. How the mighty are falling. This episode of all in the royal cult is fascinating. Cants parents are being run over by a bus. Can Can’t save them or should she start worrying about the bus coming for her? Stay tuned.
These are the grandparents of the future, future king. It’s absolutely a bad sign that the Middleton ship is sinking–in public!
This is the chief cheese toast maker, head-holding lap bearer of the current heir to the throne who has deals with the press to prop up his inner circle. The cruel accuracy of the financial failure, and the lack of sycophantic “it is thought that CarolE did the best she could” language is notable.
Those stories of Will laying his head on Carole’s lap and making him cheese sandwiches are clearly from the Middelton camp. We don’t have a single picture of Will interacting with Kate’s parents or even looking at them. He probably doesn’t even really like them.
I’ve always thought those cheese-on-toast/head in lap stories (obviously fed to the press by the Middleton camp) were a veiled threat to William. Carole knows all his secrets, kind of thing.
I do think something has happened behind the scenes though – it does look like the knives are out for the Middletons, and Kate. I suspect Kate has been told in no uncertain terms that she needs to justify her existence – which is why we’re seeing much more of her “working”. Because it’s not work ethic making her do that.
👀🍿
Yeah, very interesting that the wealthy sons-in-law haven’t intervened. Where’s Uncle Gary? Somebody shady will step forward so they can keep Middleton Manor and keep going on their Maldives vacations. Appearances are so important!
I’m thinking that this (the owed $$) has already been at least sort of worked out but it was released to embarrass them.
Especially since this amount of £ is a drop in the bucket for both Pippa’s hedge-funder (I think?) husband and for William ever since he got control of SO much more money when the Queen passed.
Neither SIL helped? What about Kate? Don’t her stans claim that she is wealthy on her own? Those lenders shouldn’t have handed out unsecured loans. Wonder what they expected. Access to royalty?
I’m guessing at least Pippa’s moderately wealthy husband is supporting their day-to-day living expenses now but I wouldn’t waste millions paying unsecured creditors in a defunct business. Take the bad headline and move on. All those debts are against the business and will go away with the bankruptcy and sale. Now they just need to cling on for living expenses and pocket change, like all the other royal adjacent beggars.
Exactly they will stomach the bad headlines and move on, probably a warning shot from Clarence House to lay low and stop briefing the tabloids! Lol
@Pinkosaurus Do you mean to tell me that the £2.6m in debt will just go away, now that they’ve sold the business? So essentially, they could’ve secured loans, pocketed the money, sold off their bankrupt company and not owe a red cent (pence)? My understanding of the unsecured loans is that while there is no collateral, the lenders can still commission a collection agency to collect the debt, or take them to court?
If they’ve handled the company legally and there’s no evidence of wrongdoing (and just running up debts the company can’t pay isn’t sufficient), the *company* owes the money not the Middletons. The assets should be completely separate and once the *company* money is gone, the creditors are out of luck. Money belonging to the Middletons personally can’t be touched.
The creditors can’t take the Middletons to court – they don’t owe anything, the company does.
Having said that, they couldn’t take out loans to the company then pocket the money personally because that money would belong to the company not them.
There are exceptions – if the Middletons personally guaranteed any of the loans or if they can be proved to have done something dodgy but other than that, their personal wealth is pretty much untouchable. That’s basically what limited companies are FOR.
@Talia, absolutely, and thank you for the clarification. My husband has a limited company for his business and that’s the very reason why I cannot fathom accruing debt that the company cannot pay off. It hasn’t occurred to me to ever defraud any lenders (we haven’t had to take out loans), so the idea of the Middletons deliberately doing that, knowing they’re insolvent, is just plain wrong.
Further, I assume (not the best deduction method, of course) that Carole probably paid herself a nice salary, and that the money funding their lavish lifestyle was written off as business expenses, which was my definition of “pocketing” the money. Technically legal, right? But so very wrong.
so was she in Jordan to try and negotiate for bags of cash? lol
^^ This 1000%.
St Catherine is now in a mad scramble to secure access (AKA sponsors) for her parents.
I am guessing they will become brand ambassadors for some shady middle eastern owned business.
It’s literally all down hill from here. The column inches will write themselves, especially when we shift to a labour govt in two years.
The Midds are about to go through some things.
Never know who might end up needing a sheikh!
I mean, the Windsors clearly thought shaking down sheiks was fine when it was Her Maj, Chucky & Bride of Chucky doing it…
Then Carole might be the second coming of Fergie!
“Bags” full of cash, Lili? No, my dear. Bags are so gauche, nowadays it’s done with suitcases.
This only the beginning of finding out what PP was really about. People will start questioning how Middleton’s were able to afford their lifestyle the past 30 years.
Will they have to sell Middleton Manor to pay off their debts?
Where I live, they can’t make you sell your prime dwelling.
They can, & should have, put liens on the mortgage so that if the midds did sell, the bank get first money, then the liens are paid out, in the order to which they were attached.
The seller gets the rest.
Are they bankrupt or is Party Pieces a limited company that has become insolvent? There is a massive difference.
If Party Pieces is a limited company (and I can’t imagine it isn’t), unless the Middletons have issued personal guarantees to company creditors, their personal money can’t be touched. They can walk away with multiple millions in their personal accounts free and clear. I’ve always said they couldn’t fund their lifestyle from the company even when it was doing well and I still think that. I suspect that whatever their other source(s) of income is/are is still available to them so it may not effect them in the slightest.
I can see why their sons-in-law haven’t helped the company – the Middletons wouldn’t benefit in the slightest (except possibly avoiding embarrassment). Now if they start selling off *personal* assets, that’s another matter.
Talia is correct. It’s doubtful they’ll have to pay off anything to sell of debts. They took on some sort of shadow partner a few years ago, didn’t they? That means they almost certainly would’ve had to have moved the company to an LLC, if it hadn’t already been one beforehand.
I can’t imagine they’d have guaranteed loans with their personal property. They’d have to be really stupid to have done that. They undoubtedly took out one of those Brexit loans, for one. And plenty of banks were probably willing to offer them unsecured loans (non-collateral-based loans) before Brexit, too. Usually, unsecured loans are based on creditworthiness and business credentials, but… well, it wouldn’t surprise me if some banks handed them to the Middletons simply because they’re royal-adjacent.
(Unsecured loans can also come from online lenders, but that’s probably not what happened here.)
This sort of thing happens all the time, and heads can roll for it. In this case, it was probably just a few million dollars worth of unsecured loans, and it will just get a shrug unless the lenders are outed and it catches fire in the media. That probably won’t happen.
💷 188,000 can’t have included the property Party Pieces worked out of. Berkshire real estate is very expensive. Either they didn’t own the property or it was heavily mortgaged – a secured loan.
An appointed Insolvency practitioners can ‘pierce the corporate veil’ if they find incidences of ‘mis-management’ in the cases of Limited Companies. PPs is a Partnership, however, I suspect that right of the Insolvency Practitioner would be enhanced for a Partnership and that Carole & Michael could be personally held liable for debts if it is found they acted negligently, criminally or recklessly. That could involve them being financially liable which would pose serious issues for them re Middleton Manor, especially as William has now co-mingled his money into the property…..
Also the fact that Carole ‘stepped down’ just as the companies fortunes were taking a nose dive (pre-pandemic) appears to in part refute the position that the pandemic was the ‘sole’ cause of their woes. Rather it indicates that there was an existing systemic issue that was worsened by the pandemic.
The one saving grace that the Midds would have is if they could show that similar businesses were similarly as affected by the pandemic, in which case the impact of the original mis-management fall into the background and they effectively have a get out of jail card they could play. Realistically the Pandemic has widely been regarded as a force majeure i.e. act of God not contemplated by anyone, so barring any HUGE red flags pre-pandemic, I think Middleton Manor is safe for now. Also Insolvency practitioners do not like making people homeless and even when they do so, it’s a long drawn out court process with lots of publicity which will be on the public record. No secret justice when creditors are involved….
I personally feel that KFC King and Burger King are ‘doing an Andrew’ on the Midds. They’ve known about these woes for some time now and have sat on the evidence until they were ready to activate Kate’s demise.
The dust has settled on Lizzies funeral and the fanfare of the Con-A-Nation is now behind them so they can now move Kate into a more background role. I don’t think Bill will divorce her yet, rather he’ll follow his father in ‘phasing her out’ (where have we heard that phrase before?).
So they will hold the embarrassment of spilling the granular details of her parents business failure over the Midds in exchange for Kate agreeing to the terms of a ‘separation agreement’.
Basically I think William wants more autonomy and freedom to live a semi-openly ‘single life’ much in the same way his father did after his parents separated.
Initially Chuckles and Bill will sell it as just a separation and not being a precursor to a divorce, but that is exactly what it will become once he finds someone he wants to re-marry (which may already have happened). For now Bill just wants the freedom to shag about and openly be seen in public with other women, without guilt and having to invoke s8 of the human rights act every 5 mins or a super-injunction. And on the flip side the tabs love the mess – especially given how much money they made during the original War of the Wales Part 1 in the 90’s.
Bill is essentially following in his fathers footsteps, but far more ‘cleanly’ without the ‘tampon tapes’ or ‘squidgy gate’.
Thank you for explaining all of that! Very interesting that the corporate veil can be pierced, but it would take the court being interested enough to investigate. I’m sure their books look just clean enough to avoid it. I wonder if we ever will know what’s going on for some of these machinations.
I’ve just googled (limited companies are public) and it’s coming up as a limited company online.
I still think an August separation announcement is coming for WandK. The open hostility between them, along with Kate’s increasingly frazzled solo appearances and the ice cold breeze the Middletons are feeling from the establishment does not scream tenable situation, for anyone.
Party Pieces is an LLC, a limited liability company, NOT a partnership. (The Middletons made that structural change several years ago.) It is extremely difficult to pierce the corporate bill so it is very, very likely the Middleton’s personal assets will be protected. That’s the whole point of an LLC. Only if the Middletons personally guaranteed loans (and they did not) could their personal property be at risk.
Re: MipMip’s comment, I wonder if they weren’t actually gearing up for a separation announcement *last* August. That was when she made one or two appearances without Big Blue and deliberately posed her hand so people could see its absence. They (well, at least Kate and the kids) also finally settled into Adelaide Cottage after some weird stories and excuses for why they were moving into a “small” property (for their standards). There was also that footage of Charlotte leaving the helicopter with William and reuniting with Kate in the car with a pink duffel bag in hand. Looking back at that time, it almost seemed like they were slowly rolling out a separation announcement…and then Elizabeth passed.
@Beach Dreams – interesting thought. I wonder.
I think Will is chomping at the bit to be seen with a “classier” woman that’ll give him a hit of prestige and make people envious, a la Harry with Meghan. I’m sure he still resents that Harry ended up with the woman from Suits he himself likely had the hots for. After all, Will’s pretty much copying everything else Harry’s doing (certainly where “work” is concerned). I doubt Will could handle a relationship with someone like Meghan, but there’s a lot of room between someone like her and someone like Kate. Maybe they won’t divorce, but he is so clearly over Kate, my take is, even though in reality he’s just as lazy and useless as she is, he sees Kate as dragging him down, and just wants to be free to up his profile (and compete with Harry) with someone else.
@ArtFossil “Party Pieces Holdings” is actually a Limited Company – this is the entity facing Insolvency and the Insolvency Practitioner is a former KPMG Partner called Christopher Robert Pole.
Not sure if I can post a link here, but the Co No is 12191766 on the Companies House UK website.
I’m also guessing the courts awarded this case to a ‘smaller’ Insolvency Practice because of the profile of the business owners involved.
Interestingly Party Pieces Holdings was set up on the 5th of September 2019 and the 2 persons with ‘significant control’ are Michael and Carole Middleton, and they hold 250 shares each so 50:50 holding.
Having seen the above my spidey senses are tingling. I have to question why they needed a new holding company in 2019 after rumours were swirling of the companies failings, which have now culminated in insolvency?
Even more suspiciously Richard Kay writes a whole DM puff piece to dispel those ‘rumours’ about PP’s ongoing woes and actively discredits the rumours that Party Pieces was ‘in peril”. In fact he pretty much states that PP’s was ramping up. This article is pretty significant, because if proven that Michael and Carole influenced the article if could be seen as them seeking to influence public perception of their company, thereby inducing further borrowing.
For those interested the Daily mail article number is 6836789, as I am not sure if I can link it here.
IMHO the above two situations do seem connected…. my reasoning is as follows…. rumours start circulating about the credit worthiness of a family business, a journalist linked to the family writes a puff piece to refute those circulating rumours and then 6 months later a holding company is set up to possibly move assets? That same holding company is now in liquidation.
Granted that holding company could have been part of a restructuring exercise to insulate the core business, but at what point does that restructuring being to look dodgy AF, especially given the further context I have provided above ?
I think if enough creditors make noise then the liquidator might consider further investigating the sequence of actions leading up to PP’s demise. But if I am honest I think they’ll get away with the pandemic excuse. Carole must have thanked her lucky starts when the pandemic was underway, because the timing could not have been more perfect. I do however feel really bad for their creditors, they will not see a single penny on the pound given the debts.
I don’t even see the Rota really touching this one and digging until BP & Billy given them the green-light to search and destroy. This news really compromises Kate and puts her on the back foot in any separation/ divorce negotiations.
Exactly. And I think that this is an issue of a public interest (to allude to Harry’s statement) as it’s quite questionable the way they supported their lifestyle and operated at the tax payers expense .. it’s not something that interests the public. Any journalist worth his salt, should try to uncover what really went on with PP
Poor Kate, she’s having a terrible week.
Her parents are a global disaster, her husband is mia (or he’s gardening), her bil is killing it in court, but worst of all?
She’s had to work TWICE this week!
ETA: this kind of personal level report is exactly what Harry is fighting to stop. Ironic, huh?
The invisible contract works for the royals….until it doesn’t. And it seems it has stopped working for Kate. I do not think we would have seen this article 2-3 years ago.
And you know PP was in trouble 2-3 years ago, and more. And I don’t believe it was just pandemic related, I think the pandemic just exacerbated their financial problems.
Didn’t we just see them at the Jordanian wedding?
@Lee, yes, if people are correct, it looked like CarolE, Pippa, and her husband (and maybe James? The photos were so blurry) were all at the wedding last weekend. Why, I have no idea. No clue what connection the Middletons could possibly have there.
@Lorelei If I’m correct the Midds lived in Jordan for a while back in the day.
they are royal leeches, maybe went to jordan to fool another investor at the (the mother of the future queen ha ha)
I don’t know – this bankruptcy is a matter of public record and it’s business news. But if the press starts printing behind-the-scenes gossip like, “Will and Kate’s Epic Row in Jordan! No Bailout for Bankrupt Middletons!!” then that’s the kind of thing Harry’s talking about.
That’s what I was thinking, bankruptcy is a matter of public record. I think it has to be, because you’ve got to find all the people who are owed money.
@Kokiri, it’s incredible. Her family is being attacked with the same process she used against Meghan. I see what @Eurydice is saying about these headlines not being as malicious as they could be, but at the same time, a normal insolvency process at this level of $$ wouldn’t get any national coverage, right?
It seems that something in the air has shifted and Kate and her family are in the crosshairs. I feel like they wouldn’t have put out this story two years ago. Wiglet better watch her back.
I’ve said before that once the coronation was over Camilla was coming for Kate and others who crossed her in the past.
Meanwhile, I have invested** all my money into popcorn and wine shares so I’ll make a fortune while watching As The Windsors Turn (on each other). 😁🍷🍿
**stocked my kitchen
Mrs. Wails played herself if she thought she could square up against Chuck and Cow, two people who have been knee-deep in treachery and viciousness since before she was born. The ugly floral tiara was a dumb move, and the flower show upstaging was an even dumber move. Oh well.
@Sid Exactly. The hubris of Will and Kate to think they can win against Charles and Camilla is astounding.
So it looks like:
– administrators were appointed to the company. Administration is an insolvency process, and the administrators effectively take over all powers and duties of the board. It’s an out of court process, but administrators are officers of the court.
– the administrators arranged the sale prior to their appointment, and executed it immediately following their appointment (known as a ‘pre-pack’ sale).
– the buyer bought stock worth £120,000 and £60,000 for intellectual property, computers, contracts and other equipment. They didn’t buy any land or buildings, or the shares in the company itself, which means that they didn’t take on any of the company’s debt.
– there is significant debt which will be unpaid, and the company will go into insolvent liquidation after the administration.
Does that mean that any land or property they own could be used to pay back creditors? Their home? Cars? Etc
Or is it any land and property tied to the business only?
No, not unless they used any of their personal property or land to back loans, which they probably didn’t. I think the company is an LLC, and that they’ve been backing it up the last few years using unsecured loans.
Yes if the land was purchased in the name of the partnership and/ or with assets of the partnership.
Wow! I guess the Middletons have just found out that being close to royalty isn’t as lucrative as they thought it would be. They fell for all the nonsense about basking in the reflective glory and probably thought people would buy their goods because of the royal connection. Instead all it’s done is brought them to their knees. Not paying their creditors is making them look like “Poundland Trumps.” If William is happy for this to go public then they really are in trouble.
Their association with the lucrative enough that they most likely got either unsecured loans for a few years or some sort of other backing to keep afloat.
I don’t know that for sure, but I’m going to assume they did. There’s no way this happened overnight, simply because of Brexit. Their business model had to have been failing for years because of competition from, say, Amazon.
I’m not even convinced their business model was ever THAT successful. Enough to live a nice middle class (by American standards) lifestyle? Okay, sure. But to make them alleged millionaires? A mail order party supply company that only shipped locally in those years up against big companies like Oriental Trading Company and others? Yeah, I don’t buy it.
Curious that they’ve referred to Kate as the Duchess of Cambridge, rather than PoW…
That’s a pretty underhanded insult, right?
Ooh I just noticed that now, what an interesting slip👀
I was wondering if anyone else noticed that. Do they go back and forth on titles like that? No one is calling Charles the Duke of Lancaster as far as I know, that seemed really odd to me. Probably not a great sign if they don’t want to call you the Princess of Wales.
A very sly dig.
Oooh interesting! Good catch!
Maybe they’ll allow her use the Duchess of Cambridge title and not POW after the divorce.
William just came back from the wedding of a fellow crown prince to a woman whose father is a billionaire, a woman who speaks four languages, is well educated, has worked for a living and can have an intelligent conversation. The difference between his future queen and the other future queens he interacted with at the wedding must be startling to him
Pippa and her relatively wealthy husband have a large estate maybe there’s a house on the grounds that the Middletons can move into .
Sucks to be Ma Midds right about now. This must be payback from Charles and Camilla, and I don’t think calling Cameltoe at the Telegraph to run another “Kate will save the monarchy” or “King William NOW” article will help. (Good on the husbands for NOT helping. That’s not their business.)
Now, how will the Middletons make their appearances at Wimbledon? Ascot?
Depending on how much personal (non-company) money they have, this may not affect them in the slightest. The company has gone into liquidation and they’ve lost their investment. Their personal money won’t be affected.
Any sort of appearance at Wimbledon this year is a hard NO.
Carole needs to start doing pap shots at the local Waitrose – strike that TESCO.
@Flower Right? I don’t think she can do high-status social events without catching flak from the press and the aristo attendees alike (and we know she’s into flexing her royal adjacency).
I’m curious if she tries courting any press or pap sympathy (at TESCO).
@Lexistential that said it would still be hilarious to see Carole Middleton getting sozzled as per usual in the cheaper seats as she does every year with her secret stash.
The pictures from years past are hilarious.
Flower, I was wondering about their appearance at the wedding in Jordan. That certainly appeared to be someone flouting their ‘position’. I know people said that they lived in Jordan when Kate was quite young, but I will never believe that they were buddies with any of the royals. I still want to know why they were at the wedding. I would LOVE to know if C&C knew they were going to be there.
@Saucy&Sassy they’re grifters likely looking for a sponsor.
I am going to guess there is A LOT more to this PP’s story.
For those still wondering about the Trump, Jr.’s, I mean the Middleton family’s presence at the Jordan royals’ wedding, well how did Ivanka and the little Trumps get to appear at a state dinner in England while Trump was (oh God) “president”? Some people just crash events, that’s all, and they dare you to call them on it. Saying that so-and-so lived in Jordan for a few years long ago just doesn’t explain why they were in row four at a royal wedding. Did everyone one else in Jordan years ago attend that wedding? Did every foreigner attend? Course not.
I’m glad it’s coming out that the Middletons are scammers. If this business was as successful as the press portrayed it to be they would have opened up locations everywhere. It was always a front for “something”
Wasn’t Carole’s trip to New Jersey just earlier this year, the one where she posed next to a cut out of herself in a Shop Rite? Knowing full well the company was bankrupt? Was that wise, or was it too late to back out?
I think there was some legitimacy to that trip as it appears that Carole and Michael set up a holding company in 2019, so it’s possible they tried to isolate the infected part of the business from the profitable part of the business, but that failed….
Looking at these pics of Carole – either she is copying Kate’s style or she is Kate’s stylist. Either way it is slightly creepy. I always get the feeling that Carole lives vicariously through Kate.
Yeah, also gave the strong feeling that CarolE loves vicariously through Kate, just like Kharw tries it with Meghan and will do it with her daughter Charlotte as well.
The umbilical cord is strong between these two.
I always got the feeling it went both ways, Khate dressing older as influenced by her mother and CarolE leaning in to things that would be better on Khate.
Agree
It’s interesting that the press perpetuated the myth for so many years that the Middletons were successful businesspeople when the truth was the opposite. It makes you wonder what kind of deal the Middletons made with the press.
@ Amy Bee, it’s quite glorious that their image is taking an enormous hit for all of the accolades and swooning over how “brilliant” Carol was as a business owner. As for their SIL’s refusing to step in and save them from financial ruin begs the question as to how clearly they had been duped by the Meddletons and their lifetime of scams.
Can’t wait for Kaisers later details to come out into the public view!!
The deal was probably to sell out Harry and leak about his relationships. When Meghan came into the picture Kate & Carole lost their everlasting minds. Kate was fueled by jealousy and Carole used it as an opportunity to gain more favor with the tabloids. Harry leaving changed things.
My gut tells me they used the company to fund themselves and then bankrupted it after checking out. And it wouldn’t surprise me if they have other streams of income they laundered through PP until they couldn’t anymore thus emptying the company by taking in MORE debt.
The Company was used as a PR machine/ front to give legitimacy to their position as new money Sloane Rangers.
Billy and the RF really didn’t do their research…. ouch.
I wonder about the internal family dynamics, because Kate’s going to be Queen (maybe), James is the boy, and Pippa is the middle child. But Pippa is the one who married into a family with actual generational wealth. Terriblely Moderately wealthy what’s his face, actually DOES have money but is apparently smart enough with it not to bail out his in-laws.
Imagine how UTTERLY foolish Billy the Burger King must feel right now.
He was 100% lured in by a Ponzi scheme business which the Midds used as an illusion to draw him in. They essentially represented themselves as well heeled new monied Sloane Rangers and now the house of cards has come tumbling down it’s likely that uncle Gazza was bank rolling them all along, just long enough to get all three married off into money.
Pippa definitely lucked out the most as she married just the right balance of new-ish money with a slightly iffy Scottish title. By the next generation, her bambinos will be Aristos.
Kate on the other hand is in a sticky spot given how frosty are now between herself and William and this could be why we’re seeing the increase in negative headlines around her. Sad thing is the Midds no longer have a company through which to launder hefty PR payments.
Will be interesting to see how Kate survives the media onslaught from this point forward ….
What a really disgusting is this is the wealthy close to power scam people like Trump pull all of the time. Squeeze assets and cash out of banks and “friends” via “loans” and funnel it all to personal accounts before selling off what you can and declaring bankruptcy for the “business” while not paying the 2 million plus “loans” being used to enrich the scammers.
As per the article in the Daily Fail they owe the landlord of the premises PP was operating from around £56k. He is said to be a Lord somebody who is being impacted considerably by the non payment. If he was also one of those who was not invited to the Coronation- well the gossip must be Huge! 😂
“The party company run by the parents of the Duchess of Cambridge”
Is this the British aristo version of using a kid’s middle name, lol? When Kiddo is in trouble, his middle name is used. That’s when he really starts paying attention!
She still has the title of DoC, but the big push has been Princess of Wales. So by using her lesser title, is the press/whoever briefed the press using her middle name?
Given that they had to know things were going sideways, which of the boneheads decided that expanding to the US was going to save them?
I wouldn’t worry about the Middletons, and I suspect it’s a non-issue. If the company was set up properly and the company is in bankruptcy, they will be personally protected. There is nothing really to bail out.
I think they were funding their lifestyle from the business; i.e., those unsecured loans were less for the business than themselves & their homes, fancy trips, etc.
Agree, I know nothing about UK bankruptcy law, but at least in the US companies are almost always set up in a way that shields the founders from personal liabilities if the company goes under. The Middleton’s may well have lost whatever they had personally invested into the business however.
Except for their eternal shame. How will they look their aristo friends in the eye?
You guys, this little tidbit got buried:
“They approached 175 potential buyers”
ONE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY FOUR buyers said no. 👀🔍🚩
Lurker, so the real question becomes: Why did number 175 say yes?
The mixed messaging on this family has always been bizarre. In the beginning, Kate was a normal girl from a “normal” family who lived modestly. According to the media, this was what made her so perfect for William because he was desperate for a down to earth family. Then the script was rewritten. Kate was perfect for William because even though she was not an aristo, she was raised as one with the best schools, perfect manners, etc. and her mother was a self-made gazillionaire with incredible business acumen. Now Carole looks like a fool who mismanaged her plastic party crap company and took advantage of others. In addition, eyebrows will be raised even higher about their shady dealings because if they have been in financial trouble for years, how have they lived so lavishly? The fact that William made no effort (not just now but during the past several years) to bail out Mr. and Mrs. Cheese Toast speaks volumes about his relationship with them and his charming (???) wife.
I hope some of the people they swindled have some nasty cohorts or close family members who could even up the score a little. What did Malcolm X say, “By any means necessary.” Yup.
I’m glad that @kaiser has written and continues to write about the shady dealings of the Middletons. When I first read about previous blogs here, it was like no one in the British press ever paid attention to them. No investigation how their business doesn’t add up to their lavish lifestyles . More reason to believe the BP get their ideas from this blog 😀.
I’m only watching from the other side of the world, but wouldn’t anyone think if the BRF is publicly funded by taxpayers shouldn’t their citizens know who exactly their future Queen comes from.
In other breaking news- Trump is indicted on federal charges (yes!)