Solina Group completes the acquisition of Essential Cuisine Limited #Blog

Briony Wilson
10th May 2018

Solina, a leading European producer of savoury ingredients for the food industry, announces the completion of the acquisition of Essential Cuisine Limited from Nigel Crane, Neil Corlett and Jamie McGregor, the shareholders of the Company.

Headquartered in Winsford, UK, Essential Cuisine has a leading position in the UK Foodservice market through kitchen-made quality products such as stocks, jus and gravies. Essential Cuisine is a premium food-service brand trusted and endorsed by chefs across UK.

Since founding the company in 1995, Mr. Nigel Crane and the shareholders have built an established player in the UK food service market with 70 employees generating sales of €15m in 2018. The current management team will stay with the Company to support the next growth phase with the existing shareholders remaining within Essential Cuisine until the end of July to ensure a smooth transition. As Solina UK Country Manager, Adam Jones will lead the integration program with the local team.

For Solina, the acquisition represents the latest step in its growth strategy across the European food market and its second acquisition in the UK.

Laurent Weber, CEO, states ; “we have been impressed by the people of EC: they have put together a great product line for Food Service accounts in UK which will nicely complement our range of Taste products. We keep expanding our capabilities in EMEA through selected acquisitions opportunities in the savoury market – the presence of EC in the Food Service segment is a clear sign of our wish to strongly grow on this segment next to B2B and Butchers. This acquisition is a great addition to our existing UK business.”

Adam Jones, Solina UK Country Manager, said: “We have long sought to complement our leading presence in B2B sectors by securing a strong foothold in the UK Foodservice market. The acquisition of Essential Cuisine not only opens up this channel for Solina, but we also see great opportunity in the combination of our shared innovation, market and product philosophies.

Our ambition has always been to build a Group that achieves success by creating products with unmatched quality that make those memorable moments with consumers. With Essential Cuisine now part of the team, Solina UK are now better placed to make it even easier for people enjoy seriously good food”.

Nigel Crane, founder and shareholder of Essential Cuisine said “Essential Cuisine today is an important player in the UK foodservice and ingredients market following fast growth over the last 15 years, based on an effective business model and a strongly motivated team. As shareholders we realized that maintaining such growth on our own becomes more and more difficult and we decided last Autumn to find the right future partner for Essential Cuisine. Solina is the best partner for us and for the future of our organization, with interesting potential synergies. The combined group will become stronger and a more attractive partner for our UK customers”.

The parties have agreed not to disclose the transaction value.