Ferrara Buys Iconic Candy Brand 🍭

GM and welcome back to This Week in CPG. It’s been a wild few days in CPG Land so let’s dive right in. Here’s a preview:

• J.M. Smucker divests (again) 🥒

• Eat the Change scores $14M 💰

• Tia Lupita closes seed round 🌮

• Goop goes mass market 💲

• Diageo gets into RTD game 🥃

Shout-out to Numeral for making e-commerce sales taxes so so easy.

Ferrara Candy Co. Buys Jelly Belly 🍭

Iconic confectionery brand Jelly Belly has a new home after Ferrara Candy Company scooped it up for an undisclosed sum yesterday. Once the deal closes, all 800 Jelly Belly employees and their three manufacturing facilities in California, Illinois, and Thailand will be absorbed by Ferrara.

Jelly Belly traces its roots back to 1869 — the same year U.S. Grant took office — when it was founded in Belleville, Illinois. Though originally known as the Goelitz Confectionery Company, the firm renamed itself after developing and launching the Jelly Bean in the 1970s. Remarkably, despite immense global success and a near priceless trademark, Jelly Belly remained a family-owned operation for six generations. That was until yesterday, of course.

The current chairman of Jelly Belly, the 82-year-old Herman Rowland, clearly believes that for Jelly Belly to thrive for another 150+ years, they need a steward like Ferrara to safeguard the brand and its employees. “As we considered the future of Jelly Belly Candy Company, we have been steadfast in our commitment to create a win-win situation for our employees, consumers, and products,” said Herman Rowland.

Jelly Belly joins a host of successful brands at Ferrara. The Chicago-based firm, now a subsidiary of Italian confectionery giant Ferrero Group, also owns Black Forest, Brach’s, Laffy Taffy, Lemonheads, Nerds, Trolli, and many others. In short, Jelly Belly is in good hands.

Lately there’s been quite a bit of confectionery M&A. Earlier this year, Ferrara Candy Company purchased Brazilian sweets & snacks giant Dori Alimentos for an undisclosed sum, and Nestlé acquired Grupo CRM, another Brazilian confectionery firm, from Advent International in September.

Deals 💰

Mergers & Acquisitions 

• The J.M. Smucker Company sold a number of Canadian fermented food brands to TreeHouse Foods for $20M. Brands included in the transaction: Bick’s Pickles, Habitat, Woodman’s, and McClarens. Smucker has made a bunch of moves lately. They acquired Hostess Brands for $5.6B in September, and sold several pet food brands for $1.2B in February. PR Newswire 

• London-based vegan cheese brand Palace Culture was acquired by The Compleat Food Group, a UK-based firm that owns a number of deli and pastry brands. Terms weren’t disclosed. Palace Culture’s packaging is terrific IMO. Vegconomist

• Shareholders of Sovos Brands unanimously (and unsurprisingly) approved Campbell Soup’s $2.7B acquisition of the company. FoodBev

• Consumer goods giant P&G is exploring a possible sale of its VS Sassoon business in China. P&G expects the haircare brand to fetch upwards of $1B. Bloomberg

Fundraising

• Eat the Change, the CPG firm behind Just Ice Tea and Cosmic Chews, secured another $14M in growth funding. The company, co-founded by serial entrepreneur Seth Goldman, previously raised $14.5M co-led by Collaborative Fund and S2G Ventures last August. BevNET

• Tia Lupita, a purveyor of Mexican pantry staples, closed a $2.6M seed round co-led by Santatera Capital and GBM Ventures. Tia Lupita sells a variety of products including salsas, hot sauces, tortillas, and chips. Their retail partners include Albertsons, Kroger, Target, Walmart, and others. Snack and Bakery

• Society Brands, a tech-enabled acquirer of consumer brands, raised an additional $25M in equity funding. Investors include Callais Capital and North Coast Ventures. Thus far Society Brands has acquired Capsule Supplies, Power Theory, Wolf Tactical, and others. FinSMEs

A Message From Numeral

BFCM & Sales Tax Don’t Mix.

When you pay sales taxes, you pay based on the net sales for the whole calendar month, not the amount that you collected.

This means that if you sell $500k of products in November (the BFCM month), but you were collecting sales tax at the wrong rates (say 5% instead of 7%), you would end up paying thousands of dollars out of pocket to the states.

That’s not the worst part—if you wait until after November 1st to turn on sales tax collection, you’d still pay sales tax for the sales that you were not collecting for. The states don’t care.

Check out Numeral’s free Nexus study and ensure that you’re compliant before November 1st.

What’s New 🤩

Apparel, Cosmetics, and Wellness

• Cider, the fast-growing, digitally-native fashion brand that Andreessen Horowitz backed in 2021, is opening their first NYC pop-up boutique on November 4th. WWD

• Goop, the beauty & wellness brand from Gwyneth Paltrow, introduced a line of mass market products called good.clean.goop. The accessibly priced line of skincare and wellness products will retail at Target and Amazon. Opening up Goop to more consumers while not diminishing their premium beauty products is a no-brainer. InStyle

• Popular nutrition brand Podium launched a new collagen collagen collection with two products: Cinnamon Roll Morning Collagen and Hot Chocolate Sleepy Collagen. Podium

• Formula Fig, a Canadian-born provider of luxury skincare services, opened their second outpost in Los Angeles. Their stores are stunning ⬇️ Beauty Independent

Food, Beverage, and Alcohol

• Spirits giant Diageo is eager to capitalize on consumer demand for RTD cocktails with The Cocktail Collection. In short, Diageo is taking some of their iconic spirits brands — Bulleit, Ketel One, and Tanqueray — and launching premium ready-to-drink cocktails. Love Diageo’s differentiated packaging vs. your standard canned cocktail ⬇️ VinePair

• Buff Greebe, an alum of Coca-Cola and Unilever, was named Executive Director of food & beverage incubator SKU. PRWeb

• Functional beverage brand REBBL officially launched their new organic juice line which features Aquamin, an algae that supports bone, joint, and gut health. SYSTM Foods acquired both REBBL and Chameleon Cold Brew last year ⬇️ PR Newswire

Data 🖥️

• Some interesting data from Starbucks…70% of sales are cold beverages and 50% of biz is drive-thru. Twitter

• PRIME Hydration volume up a staggering 395% over the four week period ending on September 23rd. Twitter

Distribution News 🚚

• Sustainable water brand Proud Source launched at Kroger.

• Siete Foods launched their grain free puffs at H-E-B.

• REBBL launched their juice line at Whole Foods Market.