Its new owners, Fifi and Ally, the upmarket restaurant and boutique company with two outlets in Glasgow, said the buy out would be "Sex and the City meets bohemia".

It has purchased all 16 Beanscene outlets and yesterday signalled that most would be kept in their current format, though some smaller stores will be converted into "baby Fifi and Allys".

Fiona Hamilton, the lifestyle entrepreneur who started Fifi and Ally with business partner Alison Fielding, compared the deal with bringing "the casts of Sex and the City and Friends" together.

"They're different brands but with the same set of customers," Ms Hamilton said yesterday. "I visit Beanscene a lot myself and while you might get customers kicking back there on a Saturday morning in their jeans, you'll get the same people in their business clothes visiting Fifi and Ally during the week."

While she praised the Beanscene chain, she said one area she wanted to improve was the food on offer. "Food has been very important to us at Fifi and Ally and we want to bring that food philosophy with us," Ms Hamilton said.

Beanscene was sold to smaller rival Tinderbox in June and slipped into liquidation the following month after funding for an ambitious expansion programme fell through, leaving it with leases on five shops that could not be transformed into outlets.

Fifi and Ally launched in 2005 and currently has outlets on Glasgow's Wellington Street and in Princes Square. The acquisition will see the company treble its turnover to £6m and have a combined staff of around 200.

It has purchased all the Beanscene branches, which comprise eight in Glasgow, four in Edinburgh and one each in Stirling, St Andrews, Hawick and Ayr.

The deal has been financed by a private investor but neither the administrator nor Fifi and Ally would disclose either the investor's identity nor the overall cost of the buyout.

But Ms Hamilton said it fitted well with the company's plans to expand the business. "Fifi and Ally had very expensive set-up costs with a big production kitchen. We've been looking for a while to find something that would give us critical mass and benefit the company as a whole. If you have equity it is a good time to be busy in this market," she said.

"We've not made any final, hard-set decisions on which stores we might convert but are looking at some of the smaller ones to become a sort of mini-Fifi and Ally."

Blair Nimmo, head of restructuring for KPMG in Scotland and joint administrator, said he was confident that the business that had been sold to Fifi and Ally, which included the functioning stores without the liabilities of the five empty units that had been left unfurbished, was a sound one.

"Clearly one of the key issues identified for the company's demise was taking on additional units which it had yet to fit out and operate. When that funding was not available that is what brought the company into administration," Mr Nimmo told The Herald.

He added: "Not only has this saved 130 jobs, but the sale also ensures that existing customers will continue to be serviced and that the landlords and suppliers will have ongoing business."