David’s Bridal is likely to be down after its latest bankruptcy filing, but chief executive officer James Marcum said the retailer is just not out — and is able to keep its vow and deliver the all-important dress. 

Marcum told WWD in an interview on Thursday that the corporate, vertically integrated by virtue of its China-based joint-venture suppliers, will find a way to maintain delivering wedding gowns to brides because it established the terms of its bankruptcy in court. 

“We have now 30,000 orders over there at once which can be in production as we speak, that will probably be flown within the bellies of airplanes to get ’em over here to the States to be certain that these customers get ’em,” Marcum said. 

The 70-year-old chain has some experience delivering through tough times and the CEO said the corporate has “never missed a dress” through COVID-19 despite factory shutdowns, shipping back-ups within the Suez Canal and the remaining of it. 

Making that delivery for the marriage day is “a passion” and a part of the “company’s culture,” Marcum said. 

The corporate — and its culture — is being tested anew with its second bankruptcy filing in lower than five years on Monday.

While the firm’s 2018 bankruptcy was tied to a mountain of debt following a non-public equity buyout — the court took $434 million in debt off its books in that process — this week’s process was more of an echo of the pandemic, the CEO said.

“What’s really occurring here is the disruption that did come out of COVID-19,” Marcom said. “It’s still operating on this post-COVID-19 world where behaviors have modified, economic environment has modified and conditions have modified.”

Just like other retailers, David’s Bridal needed to close down in the course of the pandemic. And while brides did come back when the stores opened up, the marriage cycle was disrupted with events planned for 2020 pushed back to 2021, and so forth.

Along the best way, the corporate developed what Marcum described as “an advanced capital structure” because it took on more debts to navigate the landscape.

Likewise, couples found that weddings began becoming costlier after which more casual as people tried to maintain costs down. 

With the pandemic, the debt and changes in consumer behavior all piling on, David’s Bridal began looking for buyers last fall. And while greater than 30 would-be buyers took a have a look at the corporate, Marcum said concerns around uncertainty available in the market were an excessive amount of.

The method now continues with the assistance of bankruptcy court.

“The filing really was a step to be certain that that we had the time to get on the market and finish marketing the business and search for investors that might take David’s long run,” Marcum said. “The goal is to sell it as a going concern. The goal is to get up, perhaps not be all of your complete store base, but emerge with a David’s Bridal that’s strong. We’re an omni retailer and I think…we’re really the one omni retailer of true scale on this sector.”

At once, the corporate sells to greater than one-in-four brides through its website and 294 stores across the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. It employs about 10,000 people, including roughly 2,000 full-time employees and eight,000 are part-time staff. Earlier in April, the corporate unveiled plans to put off greater than 9,000 employees.