JAB to buy sandwich chain Pret A Manger from Bridgepoint

JAB Holding Co. agreed to buy sandwich chain Pret A Manger, adding a U.K. business to its portfolio of coffee and food brands that includes Panera Bread Co. and Au Bon Pain.

JAB and the seller, private-equity firm Bridgepoint Advisers Ltd., didn't disclose the terms of the deal in a statement Tuesday. The price is about 1.5 billion pounds ($2 billion), including net debt, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The food-and-drink empire built by JAB, a Luxembourg-based investment company backed by the billionaire Reimann family, competes in the U.S. with Starbucks Corp. and Dunkin' Brands Group. Besides Panera and Au Bon Pain, the firm owns Krispy Kreme Doughnuts and high-end coffee brands Peet's, Caribou, and Stumptown, all of which are based in the U.S. About three quarters of Pret's 530 locations are in the U.K., where it competes with Costa Coffee, the chain being spun off by Whitbread Plc, as well as Starbucks.

Pret A Manger, which sells sandwiches and salads made fresh daily in its stores, generates annual revenue of 879 million pounds, Bridgepoint said in the statement. Pret chief executive officer Clive Schlee said 2017 was the ninth consecutive year of like-for-like sales growth for Pret, which also sells organic coffee.

"All of us at Pret believe JAB will be excellent long-term strategic owners," Schlee said in the statement. The company will give 1,000 pounds to each of its 12,000 employees when the deal is completed, he said on Twitter.

JAB made an approach to buy Pret A Manger as Bridgepoint was considering a U.S. initial public offering of the company, Bloomberg News reported last year, citing people familiar with the situation.

Bridgepoint bought Pret A Manger a decade ago for about 350 million pounds. The sale represents a return of six times on Bridgepoint's initial investment, according to a person familiar with the matter. The Financial Times reported earlier on the deal and the purchase price.

JAB, run by Peter Harf, Bart Becht, and Olivier Goudet, is the largest shareholder in beauty company Coty Inc. It also owns a controlling stake in luxury goods company Bally and has a minority holding in consumer goods maker Reckitt Benckiser Plc.

The firm has spent more than $30 billion building its coffee-focused empire, which also includes three chains of shops in Europe — Espresso House in Sweden, Baresso in Denmark, and Balzac in Germany — as well as European brands sold in supermarkets, such as Douwe Egberts and Gevalia.

In January, JAB's Keurig Green Mountain Inc. agreed to take control of Dr Pepper Snapple Group Inc. for $18.7 billion.