CPL fire 2017

After the fire on Saturday, 18th June, temporary offices have been established in Waigani, where they now have operational warehouses at Badili and Waigani with critical back office business processes up and running.

“All City Pharmacy, Stop N Shop supermarkets and Hardware Haus stores were able to trade uninterrupted during this period,” the firm says in a statement.

“As CPL has been able to recover quickly and is on an express pathway to return to normal business activity, it requested the POMSOX suspension to be lifted.”

A week on from the fire that engulfed the CPL warehouse, Patel told Loop PNG that the decision to stop trading was a normal thing to do.

Immediately following the fire, POMSOX announced the ‘Trading Halt’.

“It’s a normal thing in the stock exchange of any public listed company. Because of uncertain speculation, we thought let’s hold that while we assess everything then we can do proper announcement on the loss we suffered, what the insurance situation is and how we are going to build it,” Patel said.

He said there remains positivity despite the fire destroying months of supplies and displacing almost 300 staff.

The CPL warehouse, which services 30 – odd pharmacies around the country and 10 supermarkets, burnt to the ground in the early hours of Monday morning.

In an interview with TVWAN, Patel said the board and management is currently taking stock of the damage and should be able to determine within the next couple of weeks the extent of losses.

He said they also had to re-deploy some staff while others have been told to stay home.

The company, in a statement, said CPL home-grown retailer of 30 years, City Pharmacy, sadly lost their head office and warehouse in a fire at Uduka St, Gerehu. No one was harmed in the blaze, which began around 10pm on Sunday evening.

CPL Managing Director Joe Barberis said: “The CPL teams are already working hard on minimising the impact on customers and trade. 

“We appreciate the many messages of support from the community and our business partners and will keep all stakeholders informed as we progress.”