Consumer Goods & Retail

In comparison to companies in other sectors, consumer goods companies were able to stand up to the economic crisis relatively well. Fortunately, consumer expenditures have remained reasonably stable, this is especially true for food and everyday necessities.

For suppliers to the consumer goods sector, securing the supply of raw materials remains an important issue. Fundamental thereto are regular deliveries at a constant high quality. Ultimately, the prices for raw materials and energy will remain volatile and need to be managed.

On the side of consumers, the issue remains that companies constantly need to adapt to changing consumer behaviour or should rather be ahead of the game. Trends such as wellness, organic food, local products, fresh products, indulgence, convenience, etc. demand great innovation capacity from enterprises. In addition to this, the current topics on the agenda are sustainability and CO2-footprint and both require personal as well as financial resources.

Ultimately, this will lead to a certain necessity for innovation, growth and critical mass which translates into further consolidation in the consumer goods sector. The crisis has also shown that many companies have met the challenges in the sector and have been able to generate stable returns. These characteristics are of great interest not only to strategic investors but also to financial investors.

HSH Corporate Finance has deep expertise in the consumer goods sector, especially in the area of food and fashion/textile. We have successfully advised numerous M&A transactions both on the buy-side and the sell-side and have provided advisory services for succession planning, MBOs/MBIs or partial divestitures aimed at strengthening our clients’ capital bases.

HSH Corporate Finance has, for instance, advised CITTI Handelsgesellschaft on the acquisition of Hørkam Schulz Food Service (Denmark), which provided CITTI with a platform for further growth in the strategically important Scandinavian market. Furthermore, in the course of the re-alignment of the business model, Nestlé Germany was advised in the sale of Geti Wilba. Moreover, HSH Corporate Finance advised the private investors and the management in the acquisition of the shares in the Meridian Group within the scope of an MBO.

This is only an extract from various transactions HSH Corporate Finance has successfully completed within this sector in the past years. Please contact us for further information or for more detail on our references within this sector.