Cavendish advises on the sale of The Stewart Group

Published June 23, 2011

Cavendish is pleased to announce that ECI, one of the UK's leading mid market private equity houses, has invested £12 million in The Stewart Group, a manufacturer of plastic moulded products for the gardening and catering sectors, in a deal valuing Stewarts at £17 million. The deal was structured as a management buy-in/buy-out (BIMBO) with Richard Butler, joining the business as Group CEO. Cavendish acted for Lee Mowle, the owner and CEO of Stewarts.

Richard Butler brings significant knowledge of the advanced technical plastics sector having worked for leading manufacturers in the aerospace and automotive sectors. Three other senior managers within Stewarts are also becoming shareholders in the business as part of the transaction. Lee Mowle retained a substantial shareholding in the business.

Stewarts is a very long-established UK manufacturing business with sales of £15 million. Formerly part of the Bunzl group, Lee Mowle acquired Stewarts with a partner in 2003 taking on full ownership in 2008. The gardening division supplies a comprehensive range of plastic garden products including planters, troughs, propagation lines and garden accessories. Its customers include most UK independent garden centres and national garden centre groups (such as Dobbies and Notcutts) as well major DIY and multiple retailers (such as Homebase and Wilkinson). Stewarts also supplies plastic catering products for food storage and food preparation to major UK catering distributors and cash and carry wholesalers including Booker.

Cavendish was appointed to sell Stewarts in early 2011 but in March 2011, shortly before the start of a global sales and marketing exercise, Richard Butler, with backing from ECI, made an unsolicited approach to acquire the business. Lee was so impressed with Richard's strategy for the business - combining as it did accelerated product innovation with targeted acquisitions of complementary product businesses - that he re-considered his position to sell out-right and decided to stay on to lead the continued development of the gardening and catering businesses whilst retaining a substantial stake in the new Stewarts.

Lee Mowle put it like this: ''At Stewarts we have worked hard and successfully for the last eight years to turn round the business and return it to profitable growth. We now see lots of opportunities for the business opening up in both our existing and new markets and I am delighted to bring in ECI and Richard as partners to help us do so. Cavendish played an invaluable role throughout a complex transaction and in particular getting the transaction across the finishing line.''