HOUSTON — Painted Tree Boutiques is shutting down locations across the U.S., including six stores in the Houston area, leaving hundreds of small business owners scrambling to recover thousands of dollars in inventory and lost sales.
Vendors say the sudden closures have disrupted their primary source of income and forced them to quickly retrieve merchandise from multiple locations.
The indoor marketplace once provided space for hundreds of vendors to sell handmade goods and small business products. Entrepreneurs say the model allowed them to turn their passions into profit by renting booth space, while Painted Tree handled sales in exchange for a percentage…