Cott Corp. plans to sell its beverage manufacturing business to Refresco for $1.25 billion. The transaction includes Cott’s North America, U.K. and Mexico businesses.
For more than 60 years, Cott Beverages has manufactured carbonated soft drinks, 100 percent shelf-stable juice and juice-based products, energy drinks, clear, still and sparkling flavored waters, sports drinks, new-age beverages, ready-to-drink teas, freezables and ready-to-drink alcoholic beverages. Cott Beverages generates approximately $1.7 billion in revenues.
Cott CEO Jerry Fowden said the transaction is expected to shift Cott’s core focus to the growing categories of water, coffee, tea and filtration.
“The sale of Cott’s traditional business substantially accelerates our ability to deleverage the business and positions us well to grow our water, coffee, tea and filtration businesses both organically and through value accretive tuck-in acquisitions while also giving us the optionality to expand our platforms through larger-scale acquisitions if and when the right value-enhancing opportunities present themselves,” he said.
Refrescos CEO Hans Roelofs added, “We are excited to welcome Cott Beverages to the Refresco family. We have been focused on growing our platform in both North America and Europe and this transaction is a significant enhancement to our buy and build strategy, which will provide Refresco with enlarged scale, synergies and savings alongside Refresco’s manufacturing footprint, geographic diversity, product range and customer service.
“We will now have a well-balanced portfolio with exposure to all categories for retailers in North America and Europe, in addition to a scale contract manufacturing footprint throughout these geographies from which to continue to grow both organically and by pursuing our buy and build strategy.”
Refresco is an independent bottler of soft drinks and fruit juices for retailers with production in Benelux, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, the U.K. and the U.S. Refresco offers a range of product and packaging combinations from 100 percent fruit juices to carbonated soft drinks and mineral waters in carton, PET, Aseptic PET, cans and glass.
Refresco is headquartered in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and has about 5,500 employees.
