Advantage Sales and Marketing Inc. is a leading sales and marketing agency in the U.S., providing outsourced sales, marketing and merchandising services to manufacturers, suppliers and producers of consumer packaged goods. Advantage represents over $40 billion in sales of consumer-packaged goods and manages more than 5,000 food and non-food stock-keeping units ("SKUs") on behalf of more than 1,200 clients. Advantage was the first SMA to offer national coverage to the consumer packaged goods industry, and today employs over 13,000 associates. Advantage offers a complete portfolio of services including management of headquarter sales activities, category and space management, retail services such as routine store coverage and surge/project work and complementary strategic marketing services.
Brookstone is a leading nationwide specialty retailer and product development company that develops and markets unique, innovative and proprietary-branded products. Brookstone's products are intended to make some aspect of the customer's life easier, better, more enjoyable or more fun, qualities that make the products particularly well suited for gift giving. The Company's portfolio is composed of the Brookstone and Hard-To-Find Tool brands. The majority of the products sold by Brookstone are sourced and designed in-house, which has lea to strong brand recognition and high gross margins. These products are offered to customers through the Company's proprietary distribution channels, which currently is comprised of 292 retail stores, approximately 65 seasonal holiday stores, an internet website and approximately 50 million catalogs. JWC partnered with Temasek Holdings, a limited partner, and OSIM International, a publicly traded Singaporean company, to acquire Brookstone in a going-private transaction in September 2005.
CHG Healthcare Services is a leading healthcare staffing firm that provides physicians, allied health professionals, and nurses to hospitals and healthcare organizations in all 50 states'on both a temporary and permanent basis. It is primarily focused on the physicians segment where it is one of only two providers of scale in the U.S. Founded over 25 years ago, the Company has long-standing relationships with healthcare professionals and customers, and enjoys a reputation as one of the most trusted and experienced providers of healthcare staffing services. The CHG Healthcare family is comprised of several leading brands that include: CompHealth, Weatherby Locums, Destination Healthcare Staffing, RN Network, and Foundation Medical Staffing. CHG Healthcare was acquired in December 2006.
Esselte is a leading global manufacturer and marketer of filing and workspace products for the office products industry with subsidiaries in 25 countries and sales in over 120 countries. Esselte is the market leader in the major sectors where it competes; filing products with an overall market share of 25% in Europe and 40% in North America and workplace products (staplers, perforators and moulded plastic products) with a 25% market share in Europe. Esselte's branded products are known around the world for their high quality and include brands such as Pendaflex, Oxford, Leitz and Esselte. Esselte's two largest markets are North America and Europe representing 39% and 57% of revenues respectively. Esselte was acquired in July 2002. Esselte sold its Dymo labeling division to Newell in November 2005.
EmployBridge is a leading provider of specialty staffing services and one of the largest privately held staffing companies in the United States with over 140 branches in 25 states located throughout the Southeast, Southwest and Mountain regions of the U.S. The company operates specific brands that focus on the following industries: transportation (ProDrivers'), logistics (ProLogistix'), specialty manufacturing (ResourceMFG') and professional (Resource Accounting and Personnel One'). The Company also provides traditional clerical and light industrial staffing through its StaffingSolutions' brand.
Fitness Quest is a leading marketer and distributor of home fitness and healthy living products. The Company's product line includes home fitness products marketed under brands such as Total Gym, Eclipse, Edge and BOSU Balance Trainer. The Company's products include exercise bicycles, elliptical machines, weight systems, core fitness products, steppers and rowers. Fitness Quest also has the exclusive right to sell New Balance branded fitness equipment in the United States and currently sells elliptical and bicycle product lines to home fitness consumers through the retail channel. Fitness Quest's marketing strategy emphasizes the development of both the direct/infomercial and retail channels to create strong brand recognition and to maximize revenues over the lifecycle of the products. Fitness Quest was acquired in October 2004.
Joseph Abboud is a leading men's apparel company headquartered in New York, NY. The Company designs, merchandises, sources, manufactures, markets and distributes a wide range of products, including suits, sport coats, trousers, sportswear, dress shirts, ties, and through licensing agreements, men's accessories and home furnishings. Founded in 1986, the Joseph Abboud brand name enjoys high brand awareness in the U.S. The Company is a longstanding supplier to Saks, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Bloomingdale's and Macy's West. The Company manufactures its suits, sport coats and trousers at the company-owned factory dedicated exclusively to Joseph Abboud in New Bedford, MA. Joseph Abboud was acquired in March 2004.
Mattress Firm is the third largest specialty bedding retailer in the U.S. with 295 Company-owned stores and 54 franchised stores in 19 states in the South, Southeast and Midwest. The Company carries an extensive assortment of conventional and specialty mattresses and bedding related products across a wide range of price points. Mattress Firm offers the best-known national brands such as Sealy, Stearns & Foster, Simmons, Tempur-Pedic and Select Comfort. The Company has experienced impressive growth due to high comp store sales growth, new store openings and acquisitions and has the #1 market share in nine of its top twelve Company-owned markets and a strong #2 position in the remaining three markets.
NutraSweet is the global market leader in the high-intensity sweetener industry and the largest producer of aspartame. With its introduction of aspartame in 1983, NutraSweet revolutionized the high-intensity sweetener market with its superior taste, proven safety record and functionality which has enabled food and beverage companies to incorporate aspartame in a broad variety of products. Today, aspartame is sold in over 100 countries and used in over 5,000 products by over 250 million people. With a sweetness potency 200x that of sugar's, aspartame is projected to continue its growth worldwide as food and beverage companies reduce reliance on sugar. NutraSweet constructed the world's largest aspartame manufacturing facility in Augusta, Georgia, making it the only vertical producer of aspartame in the world and the industry's lowest cost producer. These relative cost and product-quality advantages, along with the company's value-added technical assistance in product formulation and the development of a next generation sweetener neotame (40x sweeter than aspartame), ensure NutraSweet a position of competitive superiority within the high-intensity sweetener market. NutraSweet was acquired in May 2000.
Refrigeration Manufacturers, Inc. is a California-based manufacturer and marketer of cold storage rooms and replacement doors for walk-in coolers and freezers.
SimCom, based in Orlando, provides simulator-based flight training to regional airlines, business aviation and general aviation pilots with a fleet of 32 simulators located at facilities in Orlando and Vero Beach, Florida, Scottsdale, Arizona and Humberside, United Kingdom. JWC purchased SimCom in July 1998.
Sunny Delight Beverages Co. produces Sunny D beverages, which is the leading brand in the chilled juice drink segment globally with sales in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Ireland, France, Spain and Portugal. Over the course of its 38-year history, Sunny Delight has established itself as the 'Good Stuff Kids Go For' and is positioned as a more nutritious alternative to carbonated soft drinks, while being a less expensive, better tasting alternative to orange juice. Its broad portfolio of flavors and sizes has wide consumer appeal, with particular strength among the demographic segments of kids, Hispanics and African-Americans. The Punica division, which produces the leading branded fruit-based drink in Germany, was sold to Pepsico in June 2005. JWC acquired Sunny Delight from Procter & Gamble in 2004.
W/S Packaging is one of the largest domestic pressure sensitive label manufacturers. The Company prints a broad range of high-quality pressure sensitive labels for clients engaged in the food, beverage, personal care, household, commercial, promotional, industrial, direct mail, and pharmaceutical markets. The Company also manufactures complementary products such as label application equipment and provides services including commercial printing, foil stamping, promotional packaging and flexible packaging solutions. The Company has been a leader in the consolidation of the highly fragmented pressure sensitive label market, acquiring eight companies over the last five years. Headquartered in Algoma, Wisconsin, W/S Packaging services over 10,000 active customers from its network of production facilities located in markets across the U.S. W/S Packaging was acquired in January 2006.
