Cordia Harrington's The Bun Company to Become $100M Company
Written by E.J. Boyer
The Bun Companies, a Nashville-based provider of bakery products for wholesale clients, is buying a Georgia-based bakery, in a deal that will double its headcount and is expected to boost sales volumes by a third.
Terms of the deal, expected to close today, were not disclosed.
The Georgia company, Masada Bakery, is a 32-year-old, family-owned company located in Norcross, Ga. Masada specializes in artisan rolls, breads and pastries, with distribution to wholesale clients in seven states across the Southeast, including to Whole Foods, Jason’s Deli and Trader Joe’s in Nashville. The company makes over 400 bread products.
“We have for three years been aggressively looking for a business that would be a right fit,” said Cordia Harrington, founder and CEO of The Bun Companies. “In November of last year, we learned about this bakery and what a complement it would be to our bakeries because they don’t make any of the same products we do.
"It’s perfect for our large customers and if you look at today’s environment, you want something that is custom, artisan looking.”
Koby Stein, brother of Masada Bakery’s founder, will stay on as president of the Masada Bakery brand. Harrington said the plan is to keep the Georgia plant open, which employs about 260 people, and eventually grow it. In addition to new products that will complement The Bun Companies’ current line-up, Masada has a delivery fleet of nearly 40 trucks to streamline logistics.
This is the first acquisition for The Bun Companies, which Harrington founded in 1996. The company employs around 250 people locally.
“Since the beginning, all of our growth has been through organic growth … quite honestly, that’s a very painful process,” Harrington said. “It takes years to break even, you go through years of no cash flow.”
The company landed a spot on the NBJ’s most recent “Fast 100,” a list of Nashville’s fastest-growing private companies, which published last month. Harrington pegged the company's annual revenue at nearly $75 million; the purchase of Masada Bakery is expected to push that figure beyond $100 million for the first time.
“I think what this really means for us, going over that mark, now we are in a whole different level,” Harrington said. “What that means for our employees is more stability, more growth opportunities, more training opportunities.”
Harrington said she will begin looking more other acquisition opportunities once this deal settles.
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Source: BizJournals.com