Incline Management Corp. announced the sale of The Country Vintner (“TCV”) to Brockway Moran & Partners, Inc., a private equity firm headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida. TCV was a portfolio company of PNC Equity Partners II, L.P.
The Country Vintner, headquartered in Ashland, VA, is the second largest independent distributor of fine wines in the United States and the market leader in the Mid-Atlantic franchise states. TCV focuses on providing on-premise retailers (white tablecloth restaurants), off-premise retailers, and chain retailers with a diverse mix of more than 500 wine labels from around the world.
PNC Equity Partners (now Incline Equity) invested in The Country Vintner in August 2008 when it backed David Townsend, CEO, to purchase the business from the original founder. Over the course of PNC’s three year ownership, The Country Vintner successfully completed three highly accretive acquisitions that included the East Coast assets of Henry Wine, Stacole Fine Wines, and Carolina Wine Source.
“TCV is a great case study for the Incline Equity investment philosophy,” said Jack Glover, founding partner of Incline Equity Partners and director of The Country Vintner. “With the help of a very talented management team, we were able to complete three acquisitions, optimize warehouse and delivery operations, standardize pricing practices, and implement comprehensive sales force incentives. These initiatives translated into significant gross margin and EBITDA improvements in the business.”
About Incline Equity Partners
Incline Equity Partners, headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is a private equity firm focused on making investments in lower middle-market growth companies, focusing on companies with enterprise values of $30MM to $125MM across a variety of industry sectors including value-added distribution, specialized light manufacturing and business and industrial services. Typical investment types are management buyouts, ownership transitions for privately held businesses and corporate divestitures. Incline Equity Partners has experience with investing, mergers and acquisitions, leveraged finance, leveraged buyouts and growth capital.
Disclaimer
Incline Management Corporation (“IMC”) is registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as an investment adviser under the U.S. Investment Advisers Act of 1940, as amended. Registration as an investment adviser does not imply a certain level of skill or training. IMC provides investment advisory services only to privately offered funds. IMC does not solicit or make its services available to the public or other advisory clients. This press release is intended solely to provide information regarding Incline’s potential capabilities for prospective portfolio companies, and is not an offer to sell to any person, or a solicitation from any person of an offer to buy, any securities. The statements contained herein are not statements of any IMC client fund or investor and do not describe any experience with or endorsement of IMC as an investment adviser by any such client or investor.