Film and sheet giant Inteplast Group has acquired the plastic bag and food-service business of Trinity Packaging Corp.
The deal includes Trinity plants in Lewistown, Pa., and Pueblo, Colo.
Armonk, N.Y.-based Trinity will retain its heavy duty and specialty films division, which includes plants in Buffalo, N.Y., and Rocky Mount, Va. No purchase price was disclosed in an Aug. 7 news release from Livingston, N.J.-based Inteplast.
This is the third deal in 13 months for Inteplast, which bought can-liner maker Pitt Plastics Inc. in September, one month after acquiring consumer and commercial bag maker Minigrip. Inteplast will operate the Trinity units as part of its Integrated Bagging Systems (IBS) division.
Trinity “represents the quintessence of American manufacturing and family business, as embodied by four generations of the Freund family,” Inteplast founder and President John Young said in the release. “We appreciate what this heritage brings to our own group of companies.”
The acquisition “is a further investment in people and technology, and demonstrates our commitment to this industry,” Inteplast IBS division president Joe Chen added in the release.
The Lewistown and Pueblo plants together employ about 600. Inteplast officials said those plants will continue full operations.
After the deal, Inteplast's IBC unit will become one of the leading manufacturers of plastic bags and foodservice items currently serving the private label and retail and grocery markets, officials said. The Trinity businesses complement Minigrip's reclosable bags, as well as other bags and food-service items made by the IBS division, they added.
Inteplast had competed with both Minigrip and the Trinity businesses before the acquisitions, a spokesperson said.
Trinity was founded in 1917 as a paper bag maker and entered the plastics market in 1979. Firm president Peter Freund said that Trinity “will continue to grow its business units in and around industrially-packed products in both large and small formats.”
“As for the consumer and carryout divisions [being sold to Inteplast], we cannot think of a better situation for our customers and employees than to be managed by [John Young] and the Inteplast Group.”
Inteplast ranks as North America's fourth-largest film and sheet maker, with annual sales estimated at $1.5 billion, according to a recent Plastics News industry ranking. The firm employs 3,300 at 28 plants, generating an estimated 65 percent of its sales from film and the remaining 35 percent from sheet.