Custom Profile in partnership with Mosaic Capital Partners LLC, has purchased all of the company's equity from private equity owners Blackford Capital LLC.
The move allows Custom Profile, based in Walker, Mich., to operate as a 100 percent employee-owned company through an employee stock ownership plan.
The deal was announced April 22. Terms were not disclosed.
Custom Profile was first sold in 2012 by founder Sam Nicholas to Grand Rapids, Mich.-based Blackford Capital for an undisclosed amount. Nicholas started the company in 1992.
Custom Profile extrudes plastic parts for the office furniture, appliance, medical, point-of-purchase and recreational and RV industries, using compounds such as ABS, rigid and flexible PVC, PET, thermoplastic elastomers, polycarbonate and others.
The company employs about 230 people across two Michigan locations: its headquarters and manufacturing facility in Walker and a second manufacturing facility in Grand Rapids. It also employs about 150 at a manufacturing facility in Juarez, Mexico. The employees in Mexico are not eligible for the ESOP.
CEO John Boeschenstein said during a brief phone call with Plastics News that the deal means employees can now “share in the prosperity.”
“With the new capitalization, it allows us to continue our growth pattern and really build on the foundation that was built with Sam Nicholas and the last seven years with Blackford Capital,” he said.
Custom Profile is ranked No. 65 in PN's most recent survey of North American pipe, profile and tubing extruders, with sales of $48.3 million. The company has 18 extrusion lines in Walker, eight in Grand Rapids and nine in Juarez.
Chicago-based Stout was the exclusive sell-side adviser to Custom Profile.
“This really just allows us the opportunity to expand because we have access to additional capital, so we hope to continue to expand nationally to be closer to our customers and continue to diversify into additional markets,” Christa Bird, Custom Profile's chief people officer, said in an April 22 phone interview.
In October 2016, Custom Profile purchased the plastics profile extrusion business of Bemis Manufacturing Co. in Sheboygan, Wis. That business was moved to Michigan, with most of the extrusion lines going into the Grand Rapids facility. Medical lines were relocated to the Juarez plant.
That same year, in December, the company announced it was investing $2.28 million into the Grand Rapids plant and adding up to 54 jobs through 2019.
