Keiter Advisors announces the sale of EG Forrest Foodservice Company

Posted on May 9, 2016

Forrest Food Services - Middle Market M&A

Transaction Advisory

Keiter Advisors (formerly known as Keiter Stephens Advisors (“KSA”)) announces the sale of the EG Forrest Company in Winston Salem, North Carolina to Merchants Foodservice headquartered in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Merchants is purchasing selected assets of the company. The transaction closed May 6, 2016.

EG Forrest services over 1,100 broadline customers all across North Carolina as well as South Carolina and Virginia. The company was founded in 1920 by Ernest Graham Forrest and has been managed by four generations of the Forrest family since then. EG’s great grandsons, Eddy and Kevin Forrest, along with a group of other Forrest employees, will join Merchants. Future customer deliveries will be made from Merchant’s existing facility in Newberry, South Carolina.

“We are excited about welcoming our new customers into the Merchants family and expanding our customer base in the area,” said Andy Mercier, Merchants president and CEO. “We look forward to serving the independent restaurant community of North Carolina.”

“Our company is proud to join another strong, independent and family-owned business. We know they will continue serving the E.G. Forrest customers with the same service-oriented business approach we’ve maintained for nearly a century,” said Louis Forrest, CEO of E.G. Forrest.

KSA served as the financial advisor to EG Forrest in this transaction. This is the second transaction KSA has completed in 2016 and its 29th in the foodservice distribution industry.

About Keiter Advisors

Keiter Advisors is the only financial advisory firm dedicated to the foodservice distribution industry. KA is recognized as the national leader in assisting owners to:

  • Buy or sell foodservice distribution, meat processing and produce companies
  • Plan and execute transition strategies, including family buy out initiatives and third party sale
  • Examine the profitability of their business and develop viable improvement programs
  • Renegotiate existing financing arrangements and secure new lenders

KA has worked with the owners of over 120 foodservice distributors to resolve their most challenging business issues.

For additional information, contact:

Bill Beattie
Email: mailto:bbeattie@keiteradvisors.com 
Phone: 804.565.6018

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