Breaking news: Crib maker Munire shutters Echelon plant, declares bankruptcy. New Jersey based crib manufacturer Munire Furniture shuttered its Indiana factory on Friday, putting 100 workers out of a job and ending an ambitious experiment to move nursery furniture back to the U.S. To protect the parent company from the debts incurred by the Indiana operation, Munire Furniture filed for bankruptcy protection yet said it is continuing to ship orders as scheduled next week.
In a letter to dealers distributed today, Munire said:
After almost four years of investing an inordinate amount of our resources into what we hoped to have been a successful rebirth of USA manufacturing, we are saddened to have had to take the extreme decision to close the Echelon factory. We realized this was the only remaining option to free the healthier divisions of our company from having to bear the burden of its losses. Finally, the weak link in our supply chain has been removed.
The Echelon factory in Gas City Indiana was launched with great fanfare in 2010. Munire received several tax incentives to locate the plan in Indiana, including $1.35 million in tax credits, $20,000 in training grants and another $2.5 million loan in the form of economic revenue bonds issued by Gas City. The company also received $3.6 million in property tax breaks. During the past summer, when it appeared the factory was struggling, Gas City arranged for another $1 million loan.
Despite the large government subsidies, Munire told us the factory struggled to turn out product at a competitive price. Cribs from the Indiana factory had a $500 wholesale price—that means they’d be $1000 or more at retail. Simply put, there weren’t enough buyers of $1000 cribs in the market that last three years, as the economy remained sluggish.
Furniture made at the Echelon factory in Gas City, Indiana.
Munire shifted gears in the past year and lowered crib prices, hoping to make up more profit with increased volume. But the volume never materialized. The Indiana factory never accounted for more than 10% of Munire’s furniture sales (the rest of the furniture is imported from Asia).
When it became clear the Indiana factory was draining Munire’s finances, the company decided the only course was to close the plant and declare bankruptcy. Munire filed for Chapter 11, which means the company will attempt to reorganize its finances and emerge without the Indiana debts. The company tells Baby Bargains they are shipping product next week as scheduled; the bankruptcy should not affect the company’s ability to ship product in the near term. ‘
The final resolution, however, is with the bankruptcy court. We will monitor the situation and give the latest news as we get it.
2014 has been a tough year for luxury crib makers. Stanley shuttered its Young America nursery furniture division in July, citing heaving losses selling upper-end cribs and furniture. Two other crib companies (Boori, Creations) targeting the upper-end nursery market also closed in the past year.
The continuing decline of independent baby stores has hurt furniture makers (Young America was exclusively sold in boutiques). Even though Munire is sold in Babies R Us (as Baby Cache) and Buy Buy Baby, Echelon furniture was aimed at the dwindling number of independents. The initial pitch for Echelon was its “Made in America” pedigree and short shipping times (imported furniture takes longer to special order and ship). FYI: The Indian factory also made some of the Baby Cache furniture for Babies R Us; and the “Jefferson” collection (under the Munire label) for Buy Buy Baby.
The company is also to blame for the Echelon woes—Munire first marketed the furniture was Made in America, but then later added imported furniture from Asia under the Echelon name. This muddied the brand’s reputation in the market, as buyers couldn’t be exactly sure which collections were made where.
A source at Munire also tells Baby Bargains that the workforce in Indiana was also a contributing factor in the factory closure—heavy turnover at the planet contributed to soaring costs.
“We have strong indications that the reorganization plan we are working with our financial backers will quickly restore a healthy flow of product and in so doing a back to normal status,” Robert Omansky, Munire’s National Sales Director, said.
If you have an outstanding order form Munire or Echelon, we would contact your dealer to see if the bankruptcy will affect your order. And feel free to comment below on what you hear.
Final word of advice: if you are considering a Munire, Echelon or Baby Cache furniture and those items are in stock at a store, then it is fine to purchase. If you have to special order an item, we would wait and see how the bankruptcy affects Munire’s shipping. We will update this thread as we get more info.
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So does that mean you do not recommend purchasing Baby Cache cribs right now?
Hi Ann. If the Baby Cache furniture you want is in stock at a store, then that would be fine to purchase. If you have to special order, I would ask the store for advice. There may be delays with orders given the bankruptcy. We will post updates here.
Alan & Denise
I would stick with not making that purchase Ann. For your own personal safety. Why pay top dollar for a product that could be damaged or break with the possibility of no warranty? Sounds too risky to me. Better off going with a more trusted brand at this point.
Will warranties on cribs and furniture be honored by stores selling Munire?
Hi Joe: If Munire successfully reorganizes under Chapter 11 of the bankruptcy code, then we assume all warranties will be honored. That’s because the company would continue on. If the bankruptcy doesn’t succeed and the company heads into liquidation, the answer will be no. So it is up to the bankruptcy court what happens next.
Alan & Denise
authors
I purchased baby furniture from Babies R Us in Toronto, Canada in June of this year and to date, only the Baby Cache – White – Montana 6 drawer dresser was delivered. I was told in Early August that the Crib was on backorder. Babies R Us continues to advertise Baby Cache in their stores and they don’t seem to know what is going on. I would like to know if Baby Cache will honor the PO with Babies R Us as they have been paid for the item and I am still waiting for the crib and we are now into October and my baby is due any day now. Any Info at this point would be greatly appreciated.
I ordered an Echelon Chatham collection set ( crib, dresser, nightstand and toddler rail) from an independent retailer the first week of June. I was just told that I will NOT be getting the toddler rail or the nightstand since they are not going to make them or fulfill the order. I will only be getting the crib and dresser. To be honest I wanted to just cut my losses and ask for a full refund and purchase a different set however I can’t wait three more months for a new set to arrive, my baby is 6 weeks old now! Munire should be ashamed how they handled this! If you are still waiting on your order I would be very wary of actually getting it and I certainly wouldn’t purchase anything by Munire!
I recently registered for the Baby Cache Heritage crib and nursery set at Babies R Us. After seeing this post about bankruptcy of Munire, I asked my local Babies R Us manager in Charlotte, NC about warranties and ordering. He said Munire did not tell them they were going to file for bankruptcy and they only learned about it afterwards online. He said all orders that have been placed already are now stuck in the boarded up and closed factory. Babies R Us is scrambling to fulfill all existing orders and are currently even doing this with floor models. Because of this, he said there would be no guarantees and probably unlikely I would be able to get a new order shipped to me, and even less likely to be able to get the conversion kits for the crib, which were taking about 9 months to ship even prior to the plant shutting down. As an aside, a local baby furniture store here that sells high end furniture said that they stopped selling Munire 2 yrs ago due to their poor business practices. I wound up going with a completely different furniture manufacturer (Baby’s Dream) because I am so disappointed with what I have learned about Munire that I’m not willing to take the risk of even trying to order with them. I just wanted to share this information with anyone still trying to decide about purchasing Munire/ Baby Cache!
My wife and I bought the Munire Medford collection from Crib and Teen City in NJ on Sept 6th. The sales woman told us to call at the end of the month to schedule a delivery for the end of November. When my wife call on Sept 29th she was told the entire story and that our set was seized by the banks and locked up at the ports. Once they released the container then all the furniture would be delivered. The problem is that no body knows when that will happen and what if it comes damaged. then there is no way to replace it. I don’t know how this store plans on staying in business since all they sell is Munire, Echelon & Young America. We got a refund last weekend and there were 3 other couples doing the same thing. This company has cornered the market on infant furniture in central NJ and now we are heading out to Posh Baby in NY so we can over pay.
Mike,
I bought 2 Munire Crib 4 in 1 sets from Teen and Crib City in Marlton. Both beautiful sets! However, it’s now time to change into full size and I need the conversion kits. So wp_admin can I still get them or are there like ‘universal’ kits?????
Hi Cindy: You’ll have to contact Munire directly to see if they have the kits for those models! Unfortunately, there are no universal conversion kits!
My husband and I purchased the Jefferson collection set from Buy Buy Baby back in July for his daughter. We were quoted 7-9 weeks for delivery. The set came in at the end of September but there were numerous issues with the store regarding pickup (losing pieces, selling our dresser to someone else, etc.). All pieces were finally picked up and when the crib was unwrapped, one of side rails was damaged, the leg was completely cracked due to a manufacturing issue). The dresser was scratched and marred, the veneer was peeling back from the corners and the drawers were not aligned. The store tried to make good on the broken rail by giving us the rail from the floor model due to the Chapter 11 filing with Munire. They could do nothing about the dresser but refund us a portion. Needless to say, my stepdaughter was extremely upset and we are returning all the pieces for a full refund. I would not purchase this brand again. So now we are back to square one looking for nursery furniture and hoping a store will have something in stock by Christmas.
Eva we were an click away from buying from Munire and are so happy we went with our purchase with Pali. We bought the Emilia crib and dressers. Obviously, best decision after seeing the amount of unhappy customers with the other guys! Best quality we found for great prices if you’re looking for high end baby furniture is with Pali, in my opinion. We waited 9 weeks for delivery but well worth it.
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We ordered the Chatham by Echelon last March. We received everything but the nightstand late June which was great as our baby arrived first week of July. Unfortunately to date we have NOT received the night stand. I just this morning talked to our vendor (Great Beginnings) and was told about the bankruptcy but that we do expect the night stand in 4-5 weeks.. but we’ve been told this story for 9 mos so we hold no hope for it at this time. I only hope that when this settles if we can’t get the furniture that Great Beginnings will refund us for the missing furniture. This really is sad that we can’t get manufacturing working in America… possibly poor mgmt at the factory, but its hard to say.. we can only speculate at this time.
From a different perspective… I would wait before purchasing even in a store. My boyfriend was one of the employees at the Indiana plant and I personally would not hold my breath they will stand behind anything purchased even if not from the Indiana plant. The company left employees holding bad paychecks, closing plant with no warning, there is posible criminal actions being looked into for their practices at the Indiana plant. Insuance premiums were not paid for several months and employees have been left holding the bag. If this is the way they do business who would think they would stand behind products. Just a word to the wise.
If anyone had purchased the Jefferson crib in Slate from BuyBuyBaby before the Munire bankruptcy, but did not purchase the conversion kit at the same time, I was able to order it from Great Beginnings. When I asked how they were able to order the conversion kit but BuyBuyBaby was not able to, they told me that Munire had outsourced some of their manufacturing, mostly the conversion kits, to other companies that were still able to manufacture the items. They were able to tap into that network because they already had working relationships with these smaller manufacturers. Another reason to ditch the big box baby stores!
Do you have a contact number for who you spoke with? Buy buy baby “ordered” my conversion kit in August and now after months of saying its on the way have now said its not made anymore. I saw it on great beginnings website but if you knew who you spoke with it would help. Thanks.
As the former HR Director at the Indiana plant I can offer perspective here. True, employee’s pay checks bounced and many have yet to be paid. There were numerous safety issues that were reported to OSHA but were never properly investigated to include several plant fires, an amputation injury, labor law violations, civil rights violations, an active practice of discrimination against female employees. There are now a number of existing EEOC claims and pending litigation. There was criminal activity at the plant involving illegal drug use, sales, thefts, other. The organization was extremely poorly managed! The owner would fly in on his private jet a few months and “BS” everyone about how well the plant was doing yet we could not make copies on the copier because Munire could not pay the copy service. Multiple times our phones were cut off due to non-payment of bills and we had to rely on our personal cell phones. Vendors were not paid, a temp agency was bilked out of over 200k in labor/bills that went unpaid. We had no insurance because no one would insure the plant. When people were injured and sent to a medical facility for treatment we did not pay those bills either. It was obvious to everyone that cash-flow was an issue. It was obvious that the Production Manager was a racist, a bigot, and did not care for anyone’s safety. One hour after a partial hand was amputated, and despite being ordered to keep the machine off/down until the incident could be properly investigated or evaluated, the Production Manager assigned an untrained immigrant employee to the machine and it was powered back up and operating again! Think about that! A guy lost part of his hand, the machine was all bloody, and an hour late the PM put another person on the machine and powered it back up. This was, of course, after the blood and tissue had been cleaned up. After all, blood and saw dust do not mix! So after the blood and tissue was cleaned up the PM fired the machine back up and ordered an untrained person to operate it. Production must go on!!! The quality was poor. The business engaged in a lot of fraudulent practices. No OSHA logs were ever maintained, the books were “cooked”, and despite being a talented and professional HR person not even GOD could fix Munire! For the safety of all who worked there I am thrilled that it is closed and thrilled that I will be providing testimony, physical evidence and photographs in up and coming hearings with various “agencies”.
Wow, Mark – it hurts my heart to hear of the working conditions and actions of this plant. If all is true, then agreed for the safety and sanity of all involved, shut down was the right thing. I have been trying to retrieve a “toddler rail” that was owed to me from my purchase back in 2013. I have been told that it is sitting in the plant parking lot on a truck with no one to deliver it. Not sure if this really is the case, but wondered if you have any information on how to contact anyone that may help me. Do you know if the bankruptcy procedures will entertain shipping outstanding orders to customers?
Thanks
We went shopping for a crib and dresser at Buy Buy Baby and Baby’s R Us and we see that they are still selling cribs made by Munire or Baby Cache, any new update as to the status of the company or recommendations on this brand? In the version of Baby Bargains book that I have it says that this company will be re-evaluated in 2015.
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Shocker. Their furniture is beyond awful. Count yourselves lucky if you haven’t bought it yet. I have triplets, so 3 beds that have literally fallen apart and drawers in which tracking has just fallen off. Junk.
Not true! We purchased the Savanah convertible crib with two nightstands in 2007. And 15 years later my child is still enjoying her full-size Savanah bed (converted crib) & stands! It’s sad that they had to shut down.