ProAmpac acquires Trinity Packaging

Flexible packaging maker ProAmpac is pushing into larger formats with the purchase of Trinity Packaging Corp., a move that adds production sites in both New York and Virginia.

Pritzker Group Private Capital acquired ProAmpac last fall with the idea of using the company as a platform for growth, both organically and through acquisitions.

“Trinity was our No. 1 target,” said Michael Nelson, an investment partner with Pritzker Group, who laid out the rationale behind the deal.

“There were a number of things we liked about it. First, Trinity is a leader in making large-format bags for some core end markets that are very attractive to us. Those include lawn and garden, specialty industrial and food. And ProAmpac, today, has a large presence in food, but it has a small presence in lawn and garden and specialty industrial,” Nelson said.

“Trinity was a great fit to get us to enter into those markets. Second is we believe there is a great opportunity to cross sell ProAmpac's wide range of products into Trinity's core 
customers and vice versa, taking some of the expertise Trinity has in making high-graphic, high-color, very-high-quality large-format bags and selling them into ProAmpac's very diverse customer base,” he said.

“It was a very strategic fit for us,” Nelson said.

Pritzker Group, an investment vehicle for billionaire brothers Tony and J.B. Pritzker, actually had an interest in Trinity prior to closing the deal to acquire ProAmpac last year.

Trinity brings manufacturing sites in Rocky Mount, Va., and Buffalo, N.Y., as well as headquarters in Armonk, N.Y.

ProAmpac, with the acquisition, now has 22 manufacturing sites.

Trinity Chairman John H. Freund, who has been with the company for 60 years, will continue with the combined firm, taking a board seat with ProAmpac. His son, Peter Freund, former president of Trinity, will leave the company when he wants.

“The family has a number of interests including ownership of a number of minor league baseball teams as well as a share of the New York Yankees. Peter, again, at his choosing, will focus his energy on those activities,” Nelson said.

Trinity Baseball Holdings, where Peter Freund is president and principal owner, owns the Memphis Redbirds, Charleston RiverDogs and Williamsport Crosscutters.

Employment at Trinity will not be impacted, and management is staying in place.

“We're going to focus on Trinity as a growth vehicle,” Nelson said.

Trinity has been in the Freund family for generations and dates to 1917 when the firm started in New York City as a paper products distributor. Within a few years, the company starting making its own paper products. It wasn't until 1979 that the company entered the plastics business and then decided to sell off its paper operations in the 1988.

“We understand family businesses because we are one,” Nelson said about Pritzker Group. “The Pritzker family has a long history of investing in companies for the long term, taking care of employees in the community and being a good corporate citizen.”

“The combination of ProAmpac's management team coupled with Pritzker Group's reputation for long-term stewardship made them both ideal partners for the Trinity family,” Peter Freund said in a statement.

Inteplast Group, in 2013, acquired a portion of Trinity's business, described at the time as its plastic bag and food-service business.

Nelson, who leads Pritzker Groups efforts to expand its plastics business, has repeatedly made it clear that the firm has a desire to continue to grow in that market. He said he is “reluctant to give our competitors our playbook, but certainly we hope and believe Trinity is the first of several acquisitions we plant to undertake with ProAmpac. This remains a great platform.”