Franchise M&A Update: October 2024
Welcome back to Franchisor.com’s “Franchise M&A Update” column, your monthly inside scoop for all franchise M&A, industry rumors and bankruptcy stories. 1 week away from Election Day 2024, hence why this month has been juuuuust a bit slow.
Although there aren’t many to speak of this time around, there are a few notable ones that got done just before the Election Day clock started ticking a bit louder. Here are the few we saw this month:
Show Me The Money:
Commercial & Home Services:
Eagle Merchant Partners Acquires Majority Stake in Sam The Concrete Man: After many years of searching, Sam The Concrete Man has finally found a dancing partner in Eagle Merchant Partners. As one of the leaders in a small industry within commercial & home services, this seemed like an obvious fit for a major platform (Eagle Merchant Partners even owns one I documented earlier this year, TCB Franchising). However, the sticking point here was the CEO being involved in the decision-making (and the next turn) in a major way, with Todd Stewart staying on with an active role. The number was allegedly a bit higher than most “founder-driven investors” would generally pay, hence why a more mid-market Eagle Merchant Partners ended up nabbing the deal here. Expect this to be on the front end of the 3-5 year hold, I think this will get turned for a tidy profit in a hurry.
Food & Beverage
NewSpring Franchise Invests in Fast-Casual Bakery and Café Great Harvest: Continuing their interest in the food & beverage space, value investor NewSpring Capital has taken on their largest brand yet, diving into the bakery category with Great Harvest. In recent years, this category has taken quite a hit with Corner Bakery Cafe and Panera having some well-documented struggles. With this acquisition, NewSpring is looking to optimize their supply-chain (Great Harvest has a massive national accounts side of their business) and to jumpstart franchise sales, which has been largely stagnant in recent years. With some simple changes common under private equity ownership, I think NewSpring will be able to make this brand a successful one if targeting secondary, tertiary or suburban primary markets.
As always, thanks for reading! If you have any tips and have some comments you’d like me to quote you in here, please email me at zack@franchisesuppliernetwork.com. See you on the other side of the 2024 Election! We’ll see what happens…
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