Loading
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms and Conditions
Canadian Print Scholarships
  • LinkedIn
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Home
  • Community
    • Donors
    • Schools
    • Students
    • Trustees
  • Scholarships
    • Canadian Printing Industries Scholarship
    • Warren Wilkins Memorial Scholarship
    • Special Scholarships
    • Eligibility
  • News
  • Events
  • Blog
  • Jobs
    • About
    • Job Listings
    • Employers
    • Employer Area
      • Job Dashboard
      • Resume Listings
      • Submit Job
      • Submit Corporate Overview
    • Candidate Area
      • Candidate Dashboard
      • Submit Resume
    • Register
  • Contact
  • Donate
  • Menu Menu
Business growth through acquisition

Business growth through acquisition

2022-12-14/in Articles/by Editor

Source: Connecting For Results
Author: Bob Dale and Gordon Griffiths (Guest Post)

The current state of M+A activity in Canada

Companies need to evolve and grow in order to thrive. Maintaining status quo may provide regular income, but since most business relationships are not static, new customers are needed, new services should be offered, equipment needs to be replaced, and re-investment is required. Organic growth is good, but faces constant challenges, especially with our current substrate supply issues.

Merger or acquisition are options, but also face many challenges and risks. What is the current state of M+A activity in Canada? Connecting For Results has conducted a study of publicly announced deals involving Canadian companies over the past two years and can share some interesting insights.

We are aware that activity for acquisitions virtually ground to a halt in 2020 due to the pandemic. As expected, there was increased activity in 2021. However, the level of activity increased at a significant pace in 2022. In the first five months, more deals were announced than all of 2021.

Why has activity picked up so much? To a degree there was pent-up demand, with some of the deals-in-progress resuming, but most of those were completed in 2021. 

We have heard from several sellers the pandemic has taken a lot out of them, and they are now dealing with the new challenges of paper shortages and labour challenges.

Since business has picked up for many, and valuations are returning to pre-pandemic levels, with positive trends, many view now is the right time to sell. The new, and significant demands placed on business owners has given them the incentive to consider their work-life balance. Selling a business is not a simple or quick activity, and sellers are often expected to remain engaged for one or more years to support transition activity, if they wish to obtain the highest value for their company.

What’s selling?

With all this activity, what are companies buying? While the spread of purchases appears to be balanced across the industry segments, commercial printers and packaging companies represent the majority of deals. These segments also represent the majority of the companies and print volume in Canada (70 to 75 per cent). There were several closures, especially in the trade segment and cold-set web plants. Some of the commercial transactions were classified as mergers.

Who is buying?

There has been a lot of discussion about private equity (PE) buyers. While there is PE activity in Canada, we have also added ‘professional buyers’ to this category. This would include large companies/consolidators who employ professionals to review the market, assess the opportunities and put deals together. In all cases, the common element, is that the deal needs to make business sense. The synergies come from different aspects including cost reduction, business growth, and additional capabilities. New reasons to purchase a company include access to paper and labour, which are issues that are projected to remain a problem for at least a year or more.

Many deals that are based on business closures and asset sales are not publicly announced, and there are buyers interested in acquiring ‘destressed’ companies. This has always been the case, especially during times of economic challenges. Generally, very few buyers want to buy unprofitable companies as an operating entity. Most prefer to wait for the company to close, then they may acquire some of the assets, and try to secure their customers/sales. The previous owners are then left to deal with the creditors, leases, contracts, staff, and severances. This activity still requires professional support to make sure that staff, customers, creditors, suppliers, and government agencies are dealt with fairly to limit personal liability. Whatever your perspective and business goals, we wish you success!  

By Bob Dale and Gordon Griffiths
This article originally appeared in the July/August 2022 issue of PrintAction.

The post Business growth through acquisition appeared first on Connecting For Results.

Visit Website

“The mission of Canadian Print Scholarships is to attract the brightest and best students available to the graphic communications industry by providing financial assistance to enroll and continue in a post-secondary management or technical program at an approved institution.”

#print #printingindustry #packaging #signage #scholarships

Tags: Leadership
Share this entry
  • Share on Facebook
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on LinkedIn
  • Share by Mail
  • Link to Instagram
You might also like
For CEOs to promote diversity, they have to ‘walk the talk’For CEOs to promote diversity, they have to ‘walk the talk’
Survey: one in three workers may quit if required to return to office full timeSurvey: one in three workers may quit if required to return to office full time
How you can make workers feel valued based on their personalitiesHow you can make workers feel valued based on their personalities
The leader’s ultimate guide to keeping employees engaged so they don’t quitThe leader’s ultimate guide to keeping employees engaged so they don’t quit
The Importance of Providing Employees with Uptraining OpportunitiesThe Importance of Providing Employees with Uptraining Opportunities
The Importance of Having and Sharing a VisionThe Importance of Having and Sharing a Vision

Get Our Newsletter!

"*" indicates required fields

Email*
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Address

Canadian Printing Industries Scholarship Trust Fund
630 – 2 Campbell Drive
Uxbridge, ON L9P 0A3

Get our Newsletter!

"*" indicates required fields

Email*
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Mission

“The mission of Canadian Print Scholarships is to attract the brightest and best students available to the graphic communications industry by providing financial assistance to enroll and continue in a post-secondary management or technical program at an approved institution.”

© Copyright · Canadian Printing Industries Scholarship Trust Fund - Enfold Theme by Kriesi
  • LinkedIn
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
Donor Focus: Nekoosa Coated Products, LLCNekoosa Coated Products, LLC LogoRoyal Containers Ltd. LogoDonor Focus: Royal Containers Ltd.
Scroll to top

This site uses cookies. By continuing to browse the site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies.

OKLearn more

Cookie and Privacy Settings



How we use cookies

We may request cookies to be set on your device. We use cookies to let us know when you visit our websites, how you interact with us, to enrich your user experience, and to customize your relationship with our website.

Click on the different category headings to find out more. You can also change some of your preferences. Note that blocking some types of cookies may impact your experience on our websites and the services we are able to offer.

Essential Website Cookies

These cookies are strictly necessary to provide you with services available through our website and to use some of its features.

Because these cookies are strictly necessary to deliver the website, refusing them will have impact how our site functions. You always can block or delete cookies by changing your browser settings and force blocking all cookies on this website. But this will always prompt you to accept/refuse cookies when revisiting our site.

We fully respect if you want to refuse cookies but to avoid asking you again and again kindly allow us to store a cookie for that. You are free to opt out any time or opt in for other cookies to get a better experience. If you refuse cookies we will remove all set cookies in our domain.

We provide you with a list of stored cookies on your computer in our domain so you can check what we stored. Due to security reasons we are not able to show or modify cookies from other domains. You can check these in your browser security settings.

Other external services

We also use different external services like Google Webfonts, Google Maps, and external Video providers. Since these providers may collect personal data like your IP address we allow you to block them here. Please be aware that this might heavily reduce the functionality and appearance of our site. Changes will take effect once you reload the page.

Google Webfont Settings:

Google Map Settings:

Google reCaptcha Settings:

Vimeo and Youtube video embeds:

Privacy Policy

You can read about our cookies and privacy settings in detail on our Privacy Policy Page.

Privacy Policy
Accept settingsHide notification only