NEW YORK, NEW YORK – OCTOBER 25: Geoffroy van Raemdonck attends the 2022 WWD Honors at Cipriani South Street on October 25, 2022 in New York City. (Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris/WWD via Getty Images)
WWD via Getty Images
Saks Global’s day of reckoning came on Wednesday—just a little over a year after its doomed $2.7 billion acquisition of Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman. With its back against the wall after missing a $100 million debt payment, Saks filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the Southern District of Texas.
To move forward, it has secured a $1.75 billion financial commitment, including $1 billion in debtor-in-possession financing from an ad hoc group led by Pentwater Capital and Bracebridge Capital, plus $240 million in lender credit led by Bank of America, according to the Wall Street Journal. An additional $500 million will be available from the bondholder group after the company emerges from bankruptcy, expected later this year.
With the finances sorted, Richard Baker, the architect of the problems Saks now faces, was forced to relinquish his CEO title to Geoffroy van Raemdonck, former Neiman Marcus Group chief. He has accepted the challenge to restore Saks Global’s luxury department store banners—Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman—to the exalted status they once held. Plus, he will oversee Saks Off 5th luxury off-price stores and the Horchow home furnishings business.
This isn’t van Raemdonck’s first time steering a company out of bankruptcy. He forged a path forward for Neiman Marcus Group after its bankruptcy during the Covid crisis, emerging after only four months. Now he faces an even bigger test, but since the past is the best predictor of the future, he and Saks Global should emerge victorious.
Changing Of The Guard
Leading up to Sak’s bankruptcy, it experienced a mass exodus of senior leadership, including Baker’s handpicked CEO Marc Metrick. Now van Raemdonck is bringing back a trusted team from his Neiman Marcus days.
Brandy Richardson returns as CFO, a critical function given the company’s financial crisis.
Darcy Penick, former president of Bergdorf Goodman, reupped as president and chief commercial officer overseeing stores, marketing, buying, digital, analytics and customer care, and Lana Todorovich, former chief of merchandising, joins as chief of global brand partnerships.
“Geoffroy has got the band back together again and I suspect they are willing to come back because it’s him leading,” observed John B.R. Long, founder of executive placement and strategy firm Hawksnest Group and author of Hire Without Ego.
“He knows the business really well—it’s only been a year since he left. He has deep ties within the vendor community. He’s the best possible person to do the job of getting Saks out of its death spiral,” he continued.
Righting The Ship
The magnitude and scale of the task ahead for van Raemdonck and team is that much larger than before, but they’ve got muscle memory to ensure a smooth transition.
While no official Saks Global employee count is available, back in the day, Neiman Marcus operated 37 stores with 10,000 associates. Now it has 36 stores—Saks Global closed its Dallas Neiman Marcus flagship last year— and the Bergdorf Goodman flagship on NYC’s Fifth Avenue. Plus, there are 33 Saks Fifth Avenue stores, one Horchow location and about 100 Off Fifth stores.
The future of Saks Off Fifth is an open question. In early November, it announced that nine Off Fifth stores would close this January, following the closure of the Off Fifth store on NYC’s 57th Street. Many more may follow, as Neiman Marcus largely exited the off-price segment during its 2020 bankruptcy recovery, closing all but three of its 22 off-price Last Call stores.
At the time, van Raemdonck explained Neiman Marcus was doubling down on its most valuable customers who desire and can afford its true luxury brand offerings. Discounted luxury didn’t fit the bill, thus Last Call was pulled off the table.
“We are focusing additional efforts on deepening relationships with the customers whose resilience fuel our long-term profitable growth,” he said at the time.
That is likely to be the playbook he follows going forward with Saks Global, since he must recover customers who’ve abandoned its brands over the last year. Placer.ai reports that Saks Fifth Avenue visits dropped 6% in 2025, while Neiman Marcus’ foot traffic was off 5%.
Repairing Vendor Relationships
Partly to blame for the traffic shortfall is that customers couldn’t find the latest fashions they craved because Saks had been cut off by vendors waiting to be paid. Initial bankruptcy filings provide a list of the brands left hanging, and it’s a virtual who’s who in luxury.
Chanel is its largest unsecured creditor, with a $136 million claim against the company. Gucci and Saint Laurent’s parent Kering follows with $60 million outstanding.
In addition, Capri Holdings, Valentino, Richemont, Ermenegildo Zenga, LVMH, Akris, Christian Louboutin, Brunello Cucinelli, La Prairie, Estée Lauder, David Yurman, Giorgio Armani, Burberry, Dolce & Gabbana and Vince Holdings are waiting on millions upon millions of dollars in back payments.
Saks assures that the company will make go-forward payments to vendors and the goodwill developed over the years by van Raemdonck and team will be critical to holding the vendor relationships together.
“This is a business that depends on trust between the retail and the brand,” Long said, adding that van Raemdonck is in the best position to restore the trust that previous leadership lost. “This is the best possible scenario because he’s worked with all of them before.”
On a side note, Amazon has filed an objection to Saks Global bankruptcy, claiming the $475 million it invested for Saks to acquire Neiman Marcus is now virtually “worthless,” and asserted that in the current bankruptcy proceedings, it has been pushed further down the list for repayment. Amazon warned of “drastic remedies” if its concerns aren’t addressed, including the appointment of an examiner or a trustee.
As part of the original deal, a “Saks at Amazon” storefront was opened on Amazon with a guaranteed payment of at least $900 million over eight years.
“Saks continuously failed to meet its budgets, burned through hundreds of millions of dollars in less than a year, and ran up additional hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid invoices owed to its retail partners,” Amazon claimed in its filing, which has yet to be ruled upon.
Van Raemdonck’s Superpowers
The fifty-something van Raemdonck got his start consulting with Boston Consulting Group for eight years starting in 1995. However, he returned to BCG for a part-time gig during his off year, as well as joining Moncler’s board and investing in and advising Verneek, an AI enterprise company.
He found the consultant’s challenge of solving organizational problems fulfilling—and he was very good with the “vision thing.” But he left consulting because he couldn’t see the entire process through.
“We tell people what to do but then, we don’t get the chance to do it. There was no ultimate accountability,” he told me in an interview a few years ago. I was unable to connect with him about his new role.
He followed with increasingly responsible positions at Express, The Limited, LVMH, St. Johns Knits and Ralph Lauren before landing at Neiman Marcus Group in 2018.
Now he’s got the turnaround opportunity of a lifetime that will test his skills, talents and leadership like never before.
“Leadership takes vision, but it also requires courage and generosity,” van Raemdonck said. “Without courage, you won’t be able to make and implement the hard decisions that will get you to the destination. And if you aren’t generous, people won’t follow you.”
Both his courage—he had to close 22 stores during NMG bankruptcy—and generosity were on full display during his years with Neiman Marcus and they will be needed in equal measure as he tackles the formidable challenges at Saks Global.
Time For A Cultural Refresh
Restoring the corporate culture at Saks Global will be a priority, after it deteriorated under the previous regime amid senior-executive departures and increasingly strained relationships with vendors.
Clearly, van Raemdonck’s return will be welcomed by the NMG team that continued with the company, but he will need to build that same level of trust with the Saks cohort.
“Leadership is really about empowering people, giving them confidence and creating a setting where they can excel,” he explained. “That’s why I believe so much in corporate culture and values. Culture is the terrain where people can flourish and shared values bind them together.”
On that score, he excels in the personal touch. “Good leaders build relationships. Retail is a relationship business and its foundation is the human element. Ours isn’t a transaction retail business; it’s built on relationships recognizing we all need that human touch,” he concluded.
See Also:
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/pamdanziger/2026/01/16/geoffroy-van-raemdonck-returns-to-rescue-saks-global-post-bankruptcy/
