MissChu goes into voluntary administration

Popular Vietnamese tuckshop business, MissChu, has gone into voluntary administration and will retrench at least a third of its staff in Sydney.

The company's appointed administrators, KordaMentha Restructuring held preliminary talks with staff and creditors on Tuesday morning.

Non-retrenched staff will either stay on their current permanent contracts or move to casual contracts.

"Financial pressures of MissChu have been caused by the lack of controls over fixed costs in the business, the expansion of the retail tuckshops through trading and the closure of the Opera House premises without notice," KordaMentha's Rahul Goyal said.

MissChu currently employs approximately 190 people across its retail tuckshops, commercial kitchen and head office in Sydney, Melbourne and London.

The Melbourne and London businesses are not affected by the Voluntary Administration.

KordaMentha Restructuring has taken full control of MissChu's day-to-day operations and are working with management.

"It is business as usual whilst we explore the various options including the going concern sale of the MissChu business," Mr Goyal said.

"The current plan is to offer the business as a going concern in the first quarter of 2015."

The founder and creative director of MissChu, Nahji Chu, also known as The Queen of Rice Paper Rolls started MissChu as a catering business in 2007 which expanded into retail tuckshops in Sydney, Melbourne and London.

The menu, the interior design and decoration of MissChu reflects the history of Nahji's life as an Laotian refugee who fled the Pathet Laos Regime to Australia in 1975.

Its first tuckshop was on Bourke Street Darlinghurst and the business uses the humourous slogan "You ling we bling".

Mr Goyal said it was too early to fully determine the outcome of the voluntary administration with the first formal creditors meeting scheduled for January 7 in Sydney.

KordaMentha said the Administrators had taken full control of the day-to-day operations of MissChu and were working with the management of MissChu to "explore various options whilst continuing to operate the retail and catering businesses".