Carroll’s Cuisine sold to private equity group

Eight Fifty Food Group, a company in the CapVest private equity portfolio, has agreed to acquire Carroll’s Cuisine, the Tullamore-based ham maker, for an undisclosed sum.

The deal is the fourth for Eight Fifty since the pork-and-seafood company formed in 2019 with the merger of Northern Ireland’s Karro Food Group and Young’s Seafood, the UK’s biggest specialist seafood brand.

Eight Fifty is buying the Co Offaly business from Carlyle Cardinal Ireland (CCI), a joint venture between Cardinal Capital and the Carlyle Group with a diverse portfolio of corporate and real estate interests. It follows the recent exit by CCI from AA Ireland.

CCI backed a management buyout of Carroll’s from Aryzta in 2015 at a reported value of €50m. The business has increased sales by 50pc since then, the company said.

“During our partnership with Carroll Cuisine management, more than €5m has been invested,” said Jonathan Cosgrave, partner at Melior Equity Partners, an adviser to the CCI fund. “The investment enabled the brand to expand its presence in existing and new markets, increasing both sales and employment.”

Once the transaction is complete, Eight Fifty will have sales of about £1.9bn (€2.1bn), positioning the company for a possible initial public offering (IPO) in 2021.

“Carroll’s is another great European addition to our growing portfolio and creates the premier integrated platform of value-added pork products in Ireland,” said Jason Rodrigues, partner with CapVest. “We look forward to leveraging the Eight Fifty platform to further develop the business going forward.

The acquisition is the second this week from a CapVest-owned food company in Ireland. On Tuesday, Valeo Foods announced that it had added It’s All Good (IAG), the leading producer of tortilla chips in the UK, to its snack foods stable.

IAG is adding about £37m in turnover to Valeo, best known for brands such Odlums, Kelkin and Shamrock, pushing total sales over the €1bn mark

Eight Fifty’s acquisition spree has doubled the company’s size in the last year. This year the company also bought M&M Walshe and Greenland Seafood.

Carroll’s slice meats line is planned to complement M&M Walshe’s bacon, gammon and sous vide meat products.

Eight Fifty has more than 8,000 employees across 23 sites in Ireland, the UK, Germany and France.

The deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2021, subject to approval by the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission.

Source: Independent