KIND Acquires Nature’s Bakery
KIND announced today an agreement to acquire soft-baked snack bar maker Nature’s Bakery. While terms of the transaction were not disclosed, sources told The New York Times that the deal valued Nature’s Bakery at $400 million. The acquisition comes just a few weeks after KIND itself was acquired by snack company Mars.
Founded in 2011 by father-and-son duo Dave and Sam Marson, Nature’s Bakery produces nut-free and dairy-free products such as Whole Wheat Fig Bars, Oatmeal Crumble Bars and Double Chocolate Brownie Bars and aims to make “wholesome snacking more accessible to active families everywhere,” Dave Marson said in a press release. The Nevada-based brand, which sold a minority stake to private equity firm VMG Partners in 2016, can now be found at retailers nationwide such as Walmart, Costco, Target, CVS and 7-Eleven, often merchandised alongside KIND’s fruit and nut bars. (Industry watchers will note that KIND itself was once part of the VMG portfolio, before Lubetzky arranged financing to purchase it back several years later.)
“If you look at pantries across the country, odds are you will find KIND and Nature’s Bakery products sitting side-by-side,” Daniel Lubetzky, founder and Executive Chairman of KIND said in a press release. “Both brands have created loyal followings by being true to their unique value propositions. It comes as no surprise that, along with KIND, they remain one of the growth leaders within the snack bar category.”
Last month, snack and confectionery giant Mars acquired KIND through a deal valued at roughly $5 billion, three years after the company took a minority stake in KIND, though KIND remains a “distinct and separate business” within the company. Mars’ KIND acquisition as well as the addition of Nature’s Bakery to KIND’s portfolio further expands Mars’ presence in the better-for-you snacking space.
The acquisition also continues the expansion of KIND’s “growing health and wellness platform” that also includes nut cluster and trail mix brand Creative Snacks Co, KIND’s first acquisition, made last year. While KIND counts nuts as the first ingredient in the majority of its products, Nature’s Bakery products are nut-free, providing “a complementary value proposition” to the “KIND Promise” of leading with nutrient-dense ingredients, Lubetzky wrote in a LinkedIn post today. KIND will keep its supply chain separate from that of Nature’s Bakery to ensure its products remain nut-free, Lubetzky told The New York Times.
Lubetzky also said the company planned to implement a management approach that would “create a culture where we really empower our partners for them to decide what’s best for their brands.” Nature’s Bakery CEO Chris Lansing, who joined the company after leaving PepsiCo in 2017, will stay on as CEO, reporting to KIND Global President Juan Martin. She said in a press release that the deal with KIND, which now operates in 35 countries, will now allow the company to reach “even more families.”
“I am proud of our team’s efforts and success in building a brand that truly nourishes families and enables them to thrive,” Lansing wrote in a post on LinkedIn today. “We couldn’t have chosen a better partner to expand this legacy and look forward to working together to build an even larger platform of health & wellness snack offerings the whole family can enjoy. I’m excited to work with Juan Bautista Martin Alonso [and] the entire KIND organization.”
