A ready-made place
The debates began with the presentation of the two projects by Me Emmanuelle Bouillon, the legal representative. The candidates made similar offers in terms of price and staff takeover. Mehmet Sandurac is ready to put 305,000 euros on the table against 300,000 for the other investors. Both undertake to take over the two stores in Brussels (Avenue des Arts and Avenue Lepoutre) but not the one in Knokke as well as 31 employment contracts (out of a total of 45).
The big difference concerns the philosophy of the two projects against the backdrop of a question of location. Mehmet Sandurac already has a ready-made place to set up the bookstore. It will be in the former BMW show room, boulevard de Waterloo next to where he opened a second Mayfair store (clothing, furniture, decoration), the first being in Waterloo. It has 1,000 m2. A literary committee will be created, which will notably be led by the essayist and business philosopher Luc De Brabandere. “It is a triple A location, 800 meters from Avenue des Arts. This will, we hope, allow us to retain a majority of our customers.”added Me Julien Tondreau. The latter also highlighted the investment of 1.5 million planned in the new premises. This is an offer “concrete” who is planning a move”within three months” (in February 2025) while the competing offer is “vague about the location of said case”.
gullNobody is against Mehmet Sandurac even though some of them have already had problems with Renaud Larsen. We know he can have a difficult personality.”
“A new lease of life”
The four investors are, in addition to Denis Knoops, Michel Culot (VO Communication and founder of the Book Fair), Renaud Larsen, a “passionate about literature” and Patrick Parmentier who is “no longer an entrepreneuralso specified Me Bouillon. They want “work hand in hand with staff”. They haven’t found it yet.”the case” for the new Filigranes, knowing that the move from Avenue des Arts must take place no later than March 2026. With the offer from the four investors, “there is perhaps more hope of knowing this sector well. It’s a concept that only works if you bring it to life “, explained their lawyer Me Yves Brulard. “Will the concept store work with intellectual activity?” he asked himself.
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The staff, for their part, think that Mehmet Sandurac’s offer “reassures” as the location is already known. That “will bring new life to a somewhat obsolete bookstore. One of the staff members argued that “no one is against Mehmet Sandurac while some of them have already had problems with Renaud Larsen. We know he can have a difficult personality. The Mayfair project brings more stability“.
Also present and moved, Marc Filipson, the founder of Filigranes, also supported the Mayfair project. “I believe that Mehmet Sandurac can create a place”.
At the end of the hearing, Denis Knoops stood up to explain that if he had joined forces with Renaud Larsen, it was precisely to bring credibility to the project vis-à-vis the publishing world while Mehmet Santurac’s offer would have been qualified as “joke” by the publisher Hachette. And to insist on the “incredible personality of Renaud Larsen who is a physicist, active in IT and also “enlightened poet”. “My project is not that of a man who wants to make a move” by finding an affection for 1,000 empty m2 and “who will receive more than a million for the move. The former boss of Delhaize was referring to the benefit that Mehmet Sandurac could derive from the agreement signed by the owners of the Avenue des Arts building (the Unibra group) providing for early termination of the lease in exchange for compensation. Denis Knoops ended his speech by asking the judges to choose between “someone who wants to do well” or a project that gives “a literary future” at Watermarks.
The Brussels Business Court will decide as quickly as possible, no later than Wednesday November 27.
