A financial report released on Aug. 14 shows that Federated Department Stores gained $622 million in cash when it sold the remains of its defunct Fingerhut catalog to former Fingerhut chairman Ted Deikel and his partner, Tom Petters, as well as sold Fingerhut’s receivables to CompuCredit Corp. Federated paid $1.7 billion for Fingerhut and its subsidiaries in 1999.
Federated still owns and operates those subsidiaries, which include apparel cataloger Arizona Mail Order and food book Figi’s. It is seeking to sell them as well. “We hope to have those transactions completed sometime this fall,” says Federated spokesperson Carol Sanger. “We’re in negotiations now.” She won’t comment on whom the potential buyer is or whether Federated is negotiating with more than one possible buyer.
Meanwhile, Deikel told the “St. Paul Pioneer Press” on Aug. 14 that he hopes to relaunch a Fingerhut catalog for the holiday season this year. He has yet to commit to rehiring any of the more than 4,000 Fingerhut employees who were laid off this year.