Case Studies

Sale of Damika Ltd, Bacon Slicing Business to Becketts Foods Ltd

Written on 12th November 2012 by George Seward  |  Permalink

Our client was approached by a trade buyer in the sector to ask if he would consider the sale of his business. In turn, we were asked to assist the client with the sales process. A relatively simple brief, but as is often the case what seems simple initially often has a myriad of factors that can lead to tense times and some difficult decisions.

Initially we were asked to comment on a proposal or draft set of Heads of Agreement between the buyer and seller. Although the proposal was one of the fairest we had seen for a long time, there was still an opportunity to improve on the basic terms of the deal, which we were able to achieve without too much difficulty. This alone led to £300,000 of benefit for our client.

Our client also had to consider the merits of selling to one buyer versus opening up the process to other potentially interested trade parties by way of a discreet sale. It was decided on reflection that the single buyer approach was preferred, having taken account of likely outcomes, timings, deal complexities, etc.

Selling a business creates the need to involve solicitors to assist and execute the transaction. This phase is often fraught with legal jargon and we were able to introduce the client to a firm who practised straight talking. Corporate Mergers guided the client through the various stages, predicting the issues that were likely to arise and crystallising these into laymen’s terms.

During the deal, we advised our client to consider the issues of preparing the completion accounts, warranties, indemnities, service contracts, retentions and price adjustment clauses; each time, acting in our client’s best interests.

We always learn from a transaction and very often property matters can cause the greatest frustrations and problems. This was a case in point, but thankfully one that was resolved to the satisfaction of buyer and seller in November 2013.