13 Sep 2017 Rutland Invests in Armitage Pet Care
Rutland is pleased to announced that on 12 September 2017 it completed the acquisition of Armitage Pet Care (“Armitage”).
Armitage is the largest independent manufacturer and supplier of premium branded pet treats and accessories in the UK. The business, which was granted the Royal Warrant in 1976, has a strong brand portfolio, including “GoodBoy”, a leading premium dog treats brand. From its manufacturing and distribution base in Colwick, near Nottingham, Armitage supplies over 2,000 products across the dog, cat, small domestic pets, bird and fish categories to a broad customer base including the major supermarkets and specialists retailers. The company currently has a turnover of around £45 million.
Under the leadership of CEO Paul Bousfield, Armitage has outperformed a growing market in recent years through being at the forefront of positive market trends such as the ‘humanisation of pets’ and premiumisation of pet products. The business has successfully driven innovation in the category and adopted a partnership approach with its key customers.
Rutland’s investment in Armitage represents an exciting scale opportunity to support and invest behind a successful incumbent management team and to build on current expansion plans. Further investment in infrastructure of the business, including significant brand support, new product development and IT, is required to allow the business to better serve its customer base and enable Armitage to develop substantial future opportunities.
Armitage represents the sixth investment from Rutland Fund III and the third this year, following on from investments in Omar Group and Aston Barclay. The balance of funding is coming from debt facilities provided by Crescent Capital Group. The transaction was led on behalf of Rutland by Ben Slatter, Kajen Mohanadas, Matthew Hamilton-Allen, Sarah Hollyhead and assisted by Nick Morrill.
Ben Slatter, Partner at Rutland, said: “We are delighted to have completed our investment in Armitage. The business has built a strong position in a growing market and is well positioned for future growth. We are looking forward to supporting the management team and working with them to further develop the business over the coming years.”
Paul Bousfield, CEO of Armitage, said: “We are proud of developing Armitage into a high-quality treats and accessories business that has significantly changed the shape of the pet category. We are delighted to be partnering with Rutland who we are confident will be able to support us in our ambitious plans for the next phase of growth.”