AN affiliate company of Co Armagh snack maker Tayto Group has completed another major acquisition.
Montagu Group has bought the trade and assets of three businesses from AIM listed Uvenco UK PLC; namely Uvenco Vending, Snack-in-the-Box and Drinkmaster. The deal adds almost 200 employees and a further £15 million of turnover to the group and comes just weeks after the acquisition of Cambridge Vending.
Montagu director, Paul Allen, said: “When we recently announced the acquisition of Cambridge Vending, we were already working on this deal as we see vending and ‘consumption on the go’ as a key area of expansion for us. This purchase brings us another 12,000 points of sale, giving us a total of more than 25,000 across the group. It also broadens our geographical reach as the company has offices in London, Newport, Blackburn, Coventry and Liskeard and franchisees across the UK."
“Snack-in-the-Box and Drinkmaster add new complementary areas for us. Snack-in-the-Box is a UK-wide franchise operation, run through local franchisees who provide honesty boxes and vending machines. Drinkmaster manufactures and supplies sealed hot drinks such as coffee, tea, hot chocolate and soups, the sort of thing you often see on aeroplanes. All of these businesses have shown a real flair for innovation and pushing technological boundaries and that’s something we see as essential to our continued growth in the vending market. We look forward to meeting all of our new customers and building on the existing relationships they already had," he added.
The Montagu Group is owned by the Hutchinson family and has completed a number of major acquisitions since its inception in 2017. The group now turns over nearly £50m a year and employs nearly 600 people.
Earlier this week Tayto Group acquired a number of assets of Pop Notch in Maghera, including its trademark, brand name and machinery. It will now subsume Top Notch into the premises of Portlebay Popcorn in Devon, of which it took over the majority stake last year.
