Wed 8th Jul 2020 - Tossed parent company files notice of intention to appoint administrators Tossed parent company files notice of intention to appoint administrators: The parent company of Tossed, the London-based healthy eating brand, has filed a notice of intention to appoint administrators. It follows the directors of Zest Food notifying its workforce they would all be made redundant. The central London office-facing business provided healthy, fresh made-to-order food from 20 stores, primarily to office workers under the brands Tossed and Vital Ingredient. Simon Bonney and Michael Kiely, of Quantuma LLP, are expected to be appointed as joint administrators. The business had trialled four trial store openings during June, but these were subsequently closed again last week. Managing director Neil Sebba said: “This a hugely sad day for this wonderful business and its fantastic team; I simply could not ask any more of any of them. The risks around coronavirus continues to mean our guests remain at home, and walk-in sales were running at 5% of normal during the trials. It is impossible to forecast when Londoners will feel safe to travel on public transport and return to their offices as a result. Faced with contributions to furlough starting in August, redundancies became unavoidable. Unfortunately, we simply do not have a market in which to operate at the moment, and without a viable solution which had the support of all our creditor groups, the directors regrettably considered that an administration was unavoidable.” In December, creditors of Zest Food approved its company voluntary arrangement. The company said at the time Tossed-branded stores remained in growth despite “well-publicised market difficulties, systemic cost inflation and macro uncertainties”. However, the Vital Ingredient stores the business acquired in 2017 traded significantly below expectations, which led to an “unavoidable” restructuring of the whole company.