Lush's Taiwan agent Asia Lida collapsed — 28 stores shut, staff paid in soap

Asia Lida International had been the Taiwanese agent for Lush, the British handmade cosmetics brand, since 2001 — and Lush was its cash cow. In April 2010 the company collapsed without warning: all 28 stores across the island closed overnight, and 105 employees were told their March salary would be paid in inventory stock, mainly soap.

The chairman, Yeh Chang-lu, vanished and the office was empty. The company had been rumoured to be in financial trouble two years earlier and owed the bank several million NT dollars. Its Zhongxiao store sold goods at half price to raise cash in the final days.

In June 2010 the court seized about 2,600 items of soap and shower gel from the company and auctioned them for NT$351,000 — around 20% of market value. Liberty Times reported the cause as the chairman's continuous losses on side investments: Lush's money had been bet on ventures that kept losing, and when two major shareholders withdrew in early 2010, that was the last straw.