The Hut seeks £7m investment for growth
AWARD winning North West online retailer The Hut is seeking up to £7m investment to build up a war chest for acquisitions, it emerged today.
The company, led by Lancashire businessman Matt Moulding, is working with corporate financiers Clearwater and is already talking to a number of private equity houses from the region and London.
ISIS Equity partners, owners of fast-growing Manchester online travel agent On the Beach, ECI – which backed arguably the North West’s most successful dot.com business, LateRooms, are said by sources in the corporate finance community to be among the interested parties.
Based in Northwich The Hut competes with online giants Play.com and Amazon and sells CDs, DVDs, games and games consoles.It also operates a ‘white label’ online service for other retailers such as Phones4U.
It recently snapped-up the zavvi.co.uk brand name from the administrators after the demise of the high street chain, and was also interested in buying the Woolworths brand – but was outbid by home shopping giant Littlewoods Shop Direct – owned by the billionaire Barclay Brothers.
Prior to the zavvi deal The Hut’s turnover was around £27m, but is expected to rocket to £70m this year.
Carl Houghton, a partner at Clearwater in Manchester told TheBusinessDesk this morning: “The Hut is a highly attractive business for investors. It has an excellent management team, who are eager to make sure they can capitalise on further opportunities.
“The process is at an early stage but there has been strong interest.”
It is understood The Hut’s management team will not be taking money out of the business as a result of the fund-raising process. The company recently won a £5m free overdraft facility after Mr Moulding triumphed in a national challenge for entrepreneurs organised by HBOS.
