Charterhouse’s French Club Kicks Off with SIA Buyout

Charterhouse SA led the buyout of SIA from its Swedish founder, Sonja Andersson, backing the deal alongside its new investor club for France (story, page 11).

SIA is Europe’s largest wholesaler and distributor of “occasional” decorative items for the home, with a product range encompassing artificial flowers, table centres and decorations, Christmas decorations, ornaments, novelties and accessories. The company is active in the UK, Germany, Italy, Spain and Sweden and, to a lesser extent, in Benelux and Austria, as well as in its domestic market. Its turnover, currently more than FFr 400 million, is growing at some 15% per annum according to Charterhouse director Jerome Kinas, who led the deal.

The precise buyout consideration, reportedly just under FFr 300 million, has not been disclosed. Intermediate Capital Group provided FFr 69 million of mezzanine funding, including a small equity component, alongside senior debt facilities totalling FFr 140 million underwritten by Societe Generale. Charterhouse and its investor club, comprising Foreign & Colonial, Equity Finance and an unnamed Middle Eastern group, provided the balance of the institutional funding.