Teak in NYC to file for bankruptcy over Teddy sofas: owner

A bitter business divorce between a Scandinavian furniture maker and the Brooklyn retailer that exclusively hawked its viral sofas has left 300 furious customers in the lurch.

The lucrative reciprocal relationship between trendy Teddy couch-maker OMHU and peddler Teak in Greenpoint made millions of dollars while transforming the city biz from a pop-up retailer to a fixture of the trendy Brooklyn nabe.

But now Teak is urging its pissed-off customers to dispute the $2,500 charge-per-sofa on their credit card after its contract dispute with OMHU left it too cash poor to get the popular corduroy couches out of warehouse limbo just 45 minutes away in New Jersey.

“I need them to be shown for the s–tty people that they truly are,” infuriated Teak CEO Cailtin Maestrini told The Post of OMHU execs.

“They have stepped on our backs,” she said. “My employees are so burnt out and depressed that they’re just crying at the cash wrap.”

Teak’s customers have flooded social media to gripe about the debacle, claiming that they have been waiting months for their modular sofa beds to arrive.

Maestrini said the chaos began Aug. 6 when the head honcho at OMHU broke the news that the company would not be renewing its contract with Teak when it expired Aug. 16 — a move she said violates her foe’s contractual obligation to give her a 90-day notice.

OMHU was opening its own warehouse in North Carolina and entering the US market, said the executive Simon Salomonsson, according to Maestrini.

Maestrini said that meant her business not only lost its exclusive right to hawk the products in the US but also was no longer permitted to sell any more of them out of the Greenpoint shop.

At that time, Maestrini had spent $150,000 to promote OMHU products across the US for three months, which would now essentially funnel future sales right into OMHU’s pockets, she said.

“They just wanted the market for themselves,” said Maestrini, adding that she once considered OMHU’s founders as friends before they allegedly betrayed her after a 27-month business relationship.

Although Teak sold plenty of other lavish Nordic and Scandinavian items — such as a $460 steel cup rack — OMHU made up 75% of its sales, meaning the severed relationship could doom the Brooklyn store, she said.

“The first thing I said to him was, ‘You are going to destroy everything that I have built,’ ” Maestrini said she told Salomonsson.

“Immediately, I had to turn around and lay off my entire retail staff because I knew that with a loss of 75% of revenue, I couldn’t make that.”

OMHU did not respond to a request by The Post for comment.

But a company sources says it denies having any obligation to provide Teak with a 90-day contract termination, insisting that the agreement between both parties was a standard, non-exclusive, fixed, one-year contract that automatically expired without notice Aug. 14.

Maestrini said the dispute came up 300 Teddy sofas that are supposed to be headed to her customers sit in a New Jersey warehouse because she doesn’t have the money to transport them.

She said she is planning to file a Chapter 11 bankruptcy to claw her way to back into good standing.

Customer Jasmine Espana said she is $2,900 in the hole after ordering a Teddy couch in June and her supposed eight-week delivery window quietly turned into three months — and holding.

The Brooklynite claimed she reached out to Maestrini and asked for a refund, to which the CEO said it could take up to 30 days to process — a timeline Espana said was unacceptable.

“I totally understand that something went terribly wrong on their end, but I think just trying to hold on to that money just seems so unethical to me,” Espana said.

“Especially with times like these. I did save up for over a really long time to be able to treat myself to that, and now I’m still waiting to order another sofa that takes two weeks to come in, so now it’s been four months that I’ve been sofa-less.”

Espana said she ultimately disputed the charges on her credit card and was fortunately refunded the full amount — a move Maestrini is surprisingly encouraging other customers to take if they cannot wait for the shop to refund them.

Maestrini is currently trying to negotiate with her shipping partners to allow her customers to pick up their couches on their own in New Jersey but admitted the attempt could be a long shot.