The former Bush Industries building in the Mason Industrial Park is pictured.

The first report by the receiver appointed to oversee the bankruptcy of the Bush Industries and its parent company paints an interesting picture of the company’s demise.

Founded in 2021 and headquartered in Sherbrooke, Québec, eSolutions Furniture was a North American e-commerce seller of residential and commercial furniture. The company’s family of brands includes Bestar, Bush Furniture and Bush Business Furniture (BBF), bringing together the legacy of Bestar, founded in 1948, and Bush Industries, founded in 1959.

Following the official announcement on May 1 that e-Solutions was closing its plants – including the Bush Industries facility in the Mason Industrial Park in Ellicott – the company was placed into receivership to undergo a liquidation process that will conclude by the end of 2026. On May 4, Price Waterhouse Cooper was officially named as the receiver in respect of the property of Bestar Inc., Bush Industries, Inc., E-Solutions Furniture Group Inc., Bestar USA Inc., LCP Bush Holdings, Inc., Bush Management, Inc., Bush Industries of Pennsylvania Inc. and Bush Technologies Inc. pursuant to a court order rendered by the Superior Court of Quebec. On May 6, the United States Bankruptcy Court issued an order provisionally recognizing and enforcing the Canadian court’s Receivership Order in the United States.

A report prepared on the eve of that appointment provides additional behind-the-scenes details of the company’s final months and some of the conditions that led to its pending liquidation.

BOOM, THEN BUST

Bestar acquired Bush Industries in 2020, with Bestar products made at its Lac-Megantic facility in Quebec, Canada, and Bush products made at its Jamestown manufacturing facility. Bestar then rebranded as e-Solutions Furniture Group as the company moved toward an online e-commerce sales model. By 2024, e-Solutions Furniture Group had begun integrating production between its manufacturing facilities to increase capacity and leverage advantages each site provided.

The COVID-19 pandemic was good for e-Solutions Furniture as the shift to people working from home benefitted the company’s market, the Price Waterhouse Cooper report states. The boom time didn’t last long. In 2021, according to the report, the company’s finances took a turn for the worse as the combined companies, already saddled with debt from Bestar’s purchase of Bush Industries, expanded inventory too quickly.

“Due to the increased sales during the pandemic, the debtors built up large quantities of inventory in anticipation of similar levels of future sales,” the report states. “However, the anticipated sales levels did not materialize, thereby placing the debtors in a precarious financial position with strained liquidity.”

By October 2021 – less than 24 months into the new venture – e-Solutions was in default under its credit agreements. Since then, e-Solutions had entered into 17 credit/forbearance agreements with lenders, who had received no principal or interest payments since April 3, 2024, and Feb. 1, 2025, respectively. A final deadline of Jan. 15, 2026, was set for e-Solutions to deliver a binding offer to sell the business, but no such offer was received despite additional delays that extended the January deadline until mid-April.

Further complicating the company’s liquidity was a lawsuit filed after a 2018 death resulting from the collapse of a wall. The lawsuit was resolved with a without-admission settlement between the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission and Bestar for $4 million that was to be paid in installments starting in January 2025. The first payment was made on time, but the second installment of $500,000 that was due in December 2025 has not yet been paid given the company’s liquidity problems.

“According to the settlement agreement, the missed installment payment may result in Bestar losing the benefit of the CPSC settlement terms and same potentially being immediately liable for the full penalty of $16,025,000,” the PWC report states. “To date, the debtors have not been able to turn around their operations and accumulated a total of $178M in net losses between 2021 and 2024.”

Liquidity was also hurt by increased customs tariffs on international imports into the United States in 2024 – particularly from Asia, which had a significant impact on e-Solutions given its distribution channels across Canada, the United States and Asia.

Beginning in March 2025, in light of its financial difficulties, e-Solutions cut 53 positions that resulted in a 17% decrease in companywide payroll and an annual savings of $4 million. That left 498 employees across North America and 19 in Asia at the time the company announced its closure earlier this year. As of April 30, 144 employees were to be temporarily employed in Canada, Sherbrooke, Jamestown and Erie as liquidation work took place.

THE UNSUCCESSFUL SALE PROCESS

Reports after the closure of e-Solutions’ Jamestown plant mentioned the inability to sell the company. The Price Waterhouse Cooper report lends more detail to the process. Lenders were pushing for offers from liquidators for e-Solutions’ Canadian and U.S. assets and offers from third parties interested in purchasing the company by April 23, 2025. No offers were received by that deadline.

In May, the lenders extended the deadline to conduct a sales process with the help of international investment banking form Houlihan Lokey Capital Inc. with the requirement that at least one indication of satisfactory interest be received by Aug. 5, 2025, the receipt of a final binding offer on Aug. 25, 2025, and an anticipated closing date of no later than Sept. 5, 2025. No offers were received by those deadlines, either. But, a non-binding was received from a first potential buyer on Sept. 15, 2025, to purchase all of e-Solutions operating assets in the United States and Canada for $57 million. Additional funding was required to allow e-Solutions to continue to operate while the potential sale was vetted, so $2.1 million was advanced by the lenders with a deadline of Nov. 17, 2025, for a final binding offer in the sale to be received.

Sometime during this flurry of activity Chautauqua County officials became involved with at least one of the sale offers received in 2025, with county officials teaming with Empire State Development and Upstate Capital Association of New York in efforts to help make sale terms satisfactory to e-Solutions’ lenders.

“We are very disheartened regarding the recent announcement by eSolutions Furniture, formerly Bush Industries, that communicated they are dissolving the company resulting in the closing of their Jamestown furniture plant in the Town of Ellicott,” Wendel and Geise said. “The County of Chautauqua Industrial Development Agency (CCIDA) has been aware of the major challenges facing the business, and has been working proactively with them for nearly a year trying to identify a path forward that would prevent a full closure from taking place.”

The Nov. 17, 2025, deadline passed with no binding offer, meaning that potential sale had fallen through. Conversations continued between Houlihan Lokey officials, e-Solutions, the lenders and Price Waterhouse Cooper, with those talks leading to the disclosure that the first sales offer was going to be revised downward. That revised offer was never received.

A fourth forbearance agreement was reached with an extension of final binding offers given until January 15 – again with no offers received. Houlihan Lokey continued canvassing the market, resulting in two letters of interest received on Feb. 2, 2026. One appeared to be at an advanced stage in negotiation of commercial terms. Conditions that weren’t disclosed in the Price Waterhouse Cooper report led the lenders to deem the offer unacceptable, though the lenders said they were amenable to a second offer. That offer was received on Feb. 6, 2026, structured as a letter of intent subject to a one-month due diligence period with a targeted closing date in mid-April. The lenders agreed to the terms of the second offer, but on Feb. 20, 2026, Houlihan Lokey informed Price Waterhouse Cooper that the potential buyer had withdrawn the acceptable offer.

Houlihan Lokey reengaged in other potential buyers who had expressed interest, with one interested party submitting a revised binding proposal for e-Solutions’ assets by early April. e-Solutions received a non-binding indication of interest from a possible buyer on April 8, with an additional letter of interest received on April 10 from a consortium.

“This revised offer was non-binding, for an unsatisfactory price and highly conditional, and accordingly did not satisfy the lenders’ conditions,” the Price Waterhouse Cooper report states.

It was at this point that social media buzz began to appear saying Bush Industries was closing its Jamestown plant. The sale offers, however, weren’t through yet.

Price Waterhouse Cooper received a final offer on April 24, 2026. The formal purchase offer was for Bestar’s shares and was received from a group that had previously shown interest.

The lenders said the offer was not viable in its current form, with a new offer received April 29 – the same day an e-Solutions employee told The Post-Journal there wasn’t yet any firm news regarding a possible Bush Industries closing. The lenders and proposed receiver told the potential buyer that the revised offer still wasn’t acceptable in its current form, though a potential transaction relating to Bestar’s assets could be considered as part of the bankruptcy proceeding.

“Moreover, no similar offer has been received in respect of any of the other debtors’ assets, should one be received, it will be reviewed and considered by the proposed receiver and lenders, in due course,” Price Waterhouse Cooper’s filing states.

The next day, Jamestown employees were notified that 237 local employees were being laid off. A list of creditors includes many local companies, including Ahlstrom Schaeffer Electric, United Rentals, Adecco Employment Service ($10,804.39), the Jamestown Board of Public Utilities ($61,683.78), Jamestown Container ($504,634.38), Jamestown Industrial Truck Inc. ($21,863.06), Jamestown Macadam Inc., Register Graphics, the Western New York and Pennsylvania Railroad and the Chautauqua County Landfill.