Cadbury Mills Over European Expansion
By: Ainsley Brown
Happy Easter everyone.
Since it’s the Easter season I thought I ought to get into the sprite of things – well the secular aspects to the season anyway – and do an Easter story. So here is a little story about Cadbury, yes Cadbury the chocolate maker.
The UK confectionary – the maker of the Creme Egg – Cadbury, it would seem is making an unexpected drive to expand in Europe. It has put in a bid to buy the Netherlands based Leaf International, one of Europe’s largest confectionaries with annual sales of £550 million.
This bid comes as a surprise for two reasons. The first is that Cadbury has been on a program to cut back its operations in recent times. Secondly, and more specifically it has withdrew from parts of Europe already, selling its Italian operations to Leaf International back in 2007.
According to the Times, Cadbury is interested in Leafs operations in the Benelux (Belgum, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) and Scandinavian countries, which comprises much of Leaf’s operations. Cadbury would clearly not be interest in re-entering the Italian market, a market which it does left. However, what is not clear is whether Leaf’s owners, the private equity firms CVC Capital and Nordic Capital, will be interested in selling the company as a whole or in parts. In either case Cadbury should face very stiff competition from other bidders who are also looking to expand.
