Ron Bender

LOS ANGELES - Ron Bender says he has the largest bankruptcy and insolvency practice in California. "I've done something like 500 Chapter 11 cases," he said. "If you've done 10 or 20 in your career, that's considered a lot." He has also completed about as many assignments for the benefit of creditors. "I don't think anybody can even come close to that," he said. His resume on his firm's website lists about 50 larger Chapter 11 cases he's handled for debtors as well as a couple in which he represented creditors' committees. In June, Bender filed a Chapter 11 for TRX, the company that makes heavyduty exercise bands seen in gyms. In re: TRX Holdco LLC, 8:22-bk-10948 (Bankr. C.D. Cal., filed June 8, 2022). Then in July, he oversaw the sale of the 400,000-square-foot Plaza Mexico shopping center in Lynnwood for more than $164 million. "That's a very large bankruptcy sale for California." In re: Plamex Investment LLC, 8:21-bk-10958 (Bankr. C.D. Cal., filed April 14, 2021). Other companies he's sold or reorganized as Chapter 11 counsel include the largest owner of Krispy Kreme franchises, Fatburger restaurants and poultry purveyor Zacky Farms. Zacky & Sons Poultry LLC, 2:18-bk-23361 (Bankr. C.D. Cal., filed Nov. 13, 2018). Bender and his firm primarily represent middle-market companies in distress, but they also sometimes represent buyers, creditors' committees and some secured creditors. Still, about half their work is representing debtors in Chapter 11 cases. The other half is "everything else," he said, including lots of assignments for benefit of the creditors. "I would say we do more than ten times the number of ABCs today than we do Chapter 11s." These days, Section 363 asset sales within Chapter 11 far outpace traditional reorganizations, he said, because they are faster and cheaper. Assignments for the benefit of creditors outpace Chapter 11s in general for much the same reason, he said. Chapter 11s are expensive because attorney billing rates "exploded around the country," Bender said. "But our law firm did not do that. ... Our high-end billing rate -- mine -- is $650 an hour." In fact, he added, he has a nephew fresh out of NYU's law school who is billed out at a higher rate.