Edwards and Ward:
Guiding a large catering business through a management buyout
Management buyouts enable businesses to secure their futures at pivotal moments.
Find out how our deal specialists helped to guide a well-established caterer through this transition.
The challenge
Edwards and Ward (E&W) are caterers with a strong reputation among schools and businesses. Founded in 1999 by Michael Edwards and Mike Ward, E&W had grown to a team of nearly 800.
Michael Edwards’ wish to retire presented an opportunity for the business to consider its next chapter. E&W’s managing director Nick Clegg was invited to undertake a management buyout (MBO). This would involve the use of a dedicated company by Nick and the existing management team to purchase the majority of shares.
For many well-established businesses, MBOs are the ideal way to blend the passion of the current team with ambitions to keep growing. However, the process can be complicated even for experienced business owners, requiring specialist support on both sides of the deal.
Based on BKL’s reputation for completing MBOs across many sectors, we were recommended to Nick by the founders’ advisers.
What we did
Throughout the process, our deal specialists:
- Advised Nick and the management team on all aspects of the transaction
- Negotiated with the founders’ advisers
- Worked alongside Nick’s lawyers to provide input on all financial and taxation aspects of the legal documentation
- Offered pragmatic solutions when issues arose, to keep the deal on track
- In particular, we helped both parties to agree on normalised working capital, the completion accounts, the precise consideration payable and the deferred consideration payments.
The result
The MBO was completed within the timeframe set by the founders, with Nick Clegg and the management team acquiring majority ownership of Edwards and Ward.
Throughout the process, E&W continued to operate with no disruption to day-to-day business nor changes to its well-regarded brand.
Michael Edwards retired with the confidence that E&W would continue to be run with the same ethos as before, alongside the protection of existing employees’ jobs.
Mike Ward stayed with the business, endorsing Nick and the senior team post-MBO. They are focusing on future growth, broadening E&W’s customer base in a changing market.
Nick Clegg
Managing Director
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