Reuters reported this morning that Hostess Brands LLC had shelved a potential sale of the company to private bidders in favor of going public. The report cited insiders supposedly familiar with the matter who said Hostess was going to borrow money to pay a dividend to its owners and begin preparing for an IPO that would give it a higher valuation than the acquisition proposals it received.
But co-owner and CEO of Hostess, Dean Metropoulos, told Steven Bertoni at Forbes that he and fellow owner Apollo Global Management have no such plans to go public.
“An IPO is not on the table today,” Metropoulos said. “A number of people lobbed in interest to buy Hostess. We considered a number of offers well above $2 billion, but we decided there was too much upside. We’ve run the company for only two years. Not taking Hostess to its full potential is an inappropriate thing to do.”
Not only that, but there are no imminent plans for a sale either. Instead, the maker of Twinkies, Ring Dings and Cupcakes is going to continue to introduce new products, as well as looking for other brands to buy and build.
Dean Metropoulos and Apollo hooked up in 2013, offering $410 million for the bankrupt Hostess — the only bid offered. In less than two years, the owners have managed to turn Hostess from a broke brand to one that’s worth $2 billion, Forbes says.
Dean’s son Daren — the head of Hostess marketing — is also optimistic of what Hostess can do in the future
“We love owning this business, and we want continue to invest and grow it,” he told Forbes. “We haven’t even scratched the surface on the potential of this company.”
Hostess CEO Says No Plan For Twinkie IPO [Forbes]
by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist
No comments:
Post a Comment