Having stated in January its intention to sell PremiumWear, one of the titles it gained with its June 2004 acquisition of New England Business Service (NEBS), Deluxe Corp. finally divested the property this month. The buyer is Toronto-based Forsyth Holdings. Terms of the deal, which closed Sept. 16, were not disclosed.
According to Ed Villeneuve, managing director for New York investment bank Goldsmith Agio Helms, which represented St. Paul, MN-based Deluxe in the deal, Deluxe did not consider PremiumWear a core property. Minnetonka, MN-based PremiumWear sells apparel and accessories for the promotional apparel industry; its annual revenue is estimated at $50 million. Deluxe manufactures and markets checks and a variety of forms and other supplies for small and midsize businesses.
Forsyth Holdings sells licensed apparel under the Arrow, Geoffrey Beene, Pierre Cardin, and Van Heusen brands among others. It also manufactures private-label apparel for high-end retailers such as Nordstrom and mails a 36-page catalog, the John Forsyth Shirt Co., once a year in both the U.S. and Canada.