ure of its stores with a post on Facebook. Dimmeys has 40 stores, mostly in Victorian country areas. The chain never recovered from reputational damage and heavy penalties related to breaches of safety standards in 2013, although the national store network had started to shrink by that time. It sold off its flagship Richmond store for an apartment development and its Forges Footscray store and, over recent years, has steadily closed other outlets or traded from locations on short-term leases. Product sourcing was a key factor in its declining fortunes. Dimmeys has also faced intensified competition from the discount department store chains and new market entrants such as Costco and TK Maxx. While Dimmeys is closing, Harris Scarfe, another retailer that can trace its history back to the 1850s, has had another change of ownership, with Greenlit Brands selling the department store chain to a private equity firm. As previously forecast by Inside Retail Weekly, Greenlit Brands, the Australian arm of the troubled Steinhoff International, has sold the Harris Scarfe and Best & Less chains to Allegro Funds. The price of the transaction has not been disclosed, but Greenlit Brands has been keen to reduce debt levels for the Australian operations and to focus on its furniture business under the brands Freedom, Fantastic Furniture, Snooze, Plush, Original Mattress Factory and FutureSleep. The Allegro Funds deal also includes the Postie fashion chain that started in New Zealand and may involve a new alignment with the British retailer Debenhams. Greenlit Brands had planned to use the Harris Scarfe platform to roll out Debenhams department stores in Australia and licensed product ranges in Harris Scarfe stores. However, it has ended the Debenhams store rollout and will close the Melbourne central business district store early next year, the only store to have commenced trading. Harris Scarfe and Best & Less have been a financial drag on Greenlit Brands’ profitability and, like Dimmeys, have faced increasing competitive pressure. Australian Securities and Investments Commission records indicate Greenlit Brands lost $23.7 million in 2018 after making provisions for the closure of its Poco and Debenhams stores and other restructuring costs. Allegro Funds is understood to have acquired the chains as a turnaround project and it is possible that rebranding or closures of some underperforming stores could be planned. Founded in Adelaide in 1849, Harris Scarfe was acquired by The Merchant Finance Corporation in 1971 and subsequently by Charles Davis in 1976.   It was placed in administration in 2001 and was bought by Momentum Corporate, a private equity firm, who sold it in 2012 to the South African company Pepkor, which was acquired two years later by Steinhoff International, the parent company of Greenlit Brands. The second ownership change this month is the acquisition of the New Zealand Ezibuy by womenswear retailer Noni B in a $1 deal with major shareholder Alceon. Alceon has 35.9 per cent stake in the Australian Securities Exchange-listed Noni B and acquired Ezibuy, an online clothing and homewares retailer, from Woolworths in 2017. Noni B has secured a 50.1 per cent stake in EziBuy with an option to buy the remaining 49.9 per cent by the end of 2020 for $11 million in cash in a try-before-you-buy deal. Founded in 1978, EziBuy is an Auckland-based online retailer of men’s and women’s clothing, homewares and beauty products. It was acquired by Woolworths in 2013 for $309 million and sold to Alceon four years later for just $30 million. Noni B believes it can realise around $9 million in synergy savings that would significantly boost the modest $378,000 in earnings before interest, tax and depreciation on annual sales of $136 million in 2019. Noni B will pick up a customer database and an expanded product offer as well as reach into the New Zealand market and a platform that will support the company’s target of 20 per cent of sales from its online channels.