Garrett Tate Partnership and Archive Media used a misleading sales pitch to attract sponsorship for the anti-bullying textbooks. Tactics included telling advertisers that they were in partnership with a charity and that they had support from the local education authority.
A spokeswoman for the Insolvency Service, which carries out investigations on behalf of the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, confirmed that some of the advertisers were even led to believe that the companies themselves were registered as anti-bullying charities.
The court heard that the company directors siphoned off the advertising funds and printed and distributed only a small proportion of the books they had sold advertising for. The court found that the some of the sponsorship proceeds had been used to buy property in Bulgaria.
Both companies went into compulsory liquidation on 11 March.
Publisher shut down after claiming charitable link
A pair of Manchester publishing companies that falsely claimed to be producing school textbooks for charity have been closed down after a High Court hearing.