Gilde Lines Up Major Buy & Build in Germany

Beeck Feinkostgruppe, the German salad and delicatessen products manufacturer acquired in June 1997 by Gilde Investment Management of the Netherlands, will later this year acquire the German prepacked salads and dressings business of Fritz Homann Lebensmittelwerke from Unilever, subject to agreement from the EU monopolies commission.

Most of Homann’s 1900 employees will transfer to the merged group, while the remaining 130 will be deployed in the company’s former bakery products and margarine divisions, which will remain in Unilever ownership. The merger of the two businesses will establish a new convenience good group with around DM 600 million (euro 390 million) in annual sales and provide a base for continuation of Gilde’s buy and build strategy.

Homann is a strong brand in Germany’s convenience foods sector, while Beeck produces top-of-the-range chilled salads and other delicatessen products for counter sale. Gilde Investment management said the clear segmentation of target customer groups will enable Homann and Beeck to anticipate client needs as retail customer preferences change.

Equity funding for the acquisition will come from the Gilde Buy-Out Fund, which invested around DM 30 million in the buyout of Beeck from Campbell Soup Co. Full details of the much larger acquisition package structured for the Homann deal have not been released.

Investment director Ralph Wijs said the Homann acquisition demonstrates Gilde’s confidence in the future of the German market.

The February announcement of the Beeck/Unilever sale and purchase contract came just weeks after the Gilde Buy-Out Fund acquired another German food company. Pickenpack Tiefkuhlgesellschaft is a specialist processor and distributor of deep-frozen fish products. The company acquires raw materials – mainly deep-frozen Alaskan Pollock and other high-quality species – worldwide and processes them at its Luneburg plant. Pickenpack’s fish fingers, portion fillets and fish convenience food products are distributed throughout the European Union and Eastern Europe, which accounts for 35% of Pickenpack’s exports, as well as in its domestic market. Pickenpack’s 1998 turnover was approximately DM 230 million (euro 118 million).