Ted Baer is the great grandson of J.L. Brandeis who founded the Brandeis Departmental stores. Baer’s father died in 2002. At one point of time, Baer was the owner of US Hockey league team, the Omaha Lancers until he sold off the team in 2004. The bankruptcy filed by Baer cited debts between $10 million and $50 million, one of the biggest Chapter 7 bankruptcies in the country.

Baer owes about 200 creditors, including Borsheims, Nebraska Furniture Mart and ConAgra. The Baer’s lawyer said that the bankruptcy involved the couple’s personal finances and not their family business holdings. The lawyer also stated that they chose to file for bankruptcy to avoid personal liability and that the business contributed to the couple’s personal financial problems.

The court imposed a deadline for the couple to disclose more details on their bankruptcy filing. At this point, the family still runs the Georgetown Club and Brandeis Catering.

Before filing this present Chapter 7 application, Baer had filed a Chapter 11 bankruptcy case on 2 of his other companies that owned and operated a bowling alley called Thunder Alley located in Elkhorn. The 2 companies in question are BowlNebraska and Husker Bowl. Baer closed down the bowling alley in June last year without warning and explanation. According to bankruptcy records, he had been behind in payments on several loans connected to the property there. But the bowling alley was re-opened by one of Baer’s former business partners, Steve Sempeck who started to lease the 86,000 square feet property after his own bowling alley burned down.

According to Sempeck, the precipitating cause of the Baers’ financial problems was the ailing economy. Register of Deeds Diane Battiato said the Baers started to default on their mortgage loans last summer about the time they closed down Thunder Alley. The Baers had three out of their four deeds of trust with defaults filed on them.

With his companies under Chapter 11 bankruptcy and his own personal finances under Chapter 7, Ted Baer faces an uphill task in working his way out of the debts he owes.