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LL Flooring, formerly Lumber Liquidators, is liquidating after failing to find a buyer
LL Flooring, the flooring company formerly known as Lumber Liquidators, is going out of business after the bankrupt company failed to find a buyer.
LL Flooring filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last month, saying it was in negotiations with multiple parties to sell its business. The company also announced that it would close 94 stores across the U.S.
But in a statement on Wednesday, the company said that the talks had failed to yield an offer and that it now plans to wind down the business. Roughly 2,000 workers will lose their jobs.
LL Flooring, which launched in Stoughton, Mass., as Lumber Liquidators in 1994, said it would hold closing sales at its roughly 200 remaining retail locations as the company moves to shutter them over the next 12 weeks.
“Under Chapter 11 rules, the company is required to achieve the highest or otherwise best offer for the company’s business or assets and, in this case, it was determined that a sale of the company’s individual assets, holding closing sales at our stores and winding down the business will deliver the most value to its creditors,” LL Flooring said in its statement.
The company told customers that they may still place orders online and in stores until the closing process is complete and that existing orders for installations will be completed within 30 days. New orders for installation may not be placed after Sept. 6, the company said.
Lumber Liquidators was once the largest specialty vendor of hardwood flooring in North America. But a 2015 “60 Minutes” report revealed that the company, then known as Lumber Liquidators, had dangerous levels of formaldehyde in its flooring. In 2019, LL Flooring agreed to pay $33 million in fines for misleading investors about levels of the chemical in its Chinese-made laminate flooring.
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Nowadays, what makes a martini a martini? Robert Simonson, who wrote a book about the martini, said, “It’s funny: it’s strict and loose at the same time.”
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Everyone seems to have an opinion about the cocktail: “Ingredients, proportions, garnishes – it’s all subject to debate,” Simonson said. “I’m a purist. I would think it needs to be gin and vermouth. But I’m willing to bend and say, ‘Okay, vodka and vermouth as well.’ [However,] if there’s no vermouth in there, I don’t know how you can call it a cocktail.”
Simonson says the martini was probably named after a vermouth company. It was invented in America in the 1870s or ’80s when bartenders mixed gin with vermouth, a fortified wine made with herbs and spices. “It’s a very big player in cocktail history,” he said.
In the early 20th century, the “very-dry” martini became very-popular: Ice cold gin or vodka, garnished with a lemon twist, or an olive, or an onion, but only a little vermouth (or maybe not even a little).
Samantha Casuga, the head bartender at Temple Bar in New York City, says the reason why many people might not want vermouth in their martini is because, for years, vermouth was stored improperly. “It should be in the fridge,” she said.
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Casuga’s classic martini is two parts gin, one part vermouth, with a twist of lemon. She suggests that you probably shouldn’t order it the way James Bond does – shaken, not stirred. Casuga says she’s always stirring, but some people like the show behind the bar when a bartender shakes their cocktail. “Definitely, people love a good shake,” she said.
People also love to have a martini made just the way they want it. But Casuga understands why they might be so specific: “To have your own preferences, not only listened to and then executed, is, like, that’s luxury itself.”
Writer Robert Simonson says that a martini can also add a little luxury to your Thanksgiving. “It actually makes very good sense for Thanksgiving,” he said. “It will whet your appetite for the meal to come.
“There are very few American inventions more American than the martini. So, an American holiday, American drink.”
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Story produced by Mary Raffalli. Editor: Remington Korper.
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