Market leader in distribution & service for industrial boilers, pumps and accessories in the Western U.S. transitions to 100% employee ownership.
Background
RF MacDonald, a family business spanning three generations and nearly 70 years since its founding in 1956, is the premier service, distribution, and rental organization for commercial boilers, pumps and accessories throughout California and Nevada. The Company maintains long-standing relationships with leading equipment manufacturers, and ensures mission critical functionality for customers primarily in healthcare, aerospace and defense, hospitality, food processing and manufacturing.
Goals and Challenges
After over a decade of robust and sustained growth, RF MacDonald’s shareholders sought to develop an ownership transition plan that would preserve the family-centered culture and legacy of the business for its 300 employees, while avoiding the potential for adverse impacts on key manufacturer relationships, and allowing the shareholders to optimize for their desired liquidity and tax outcomes.
“I am not sure that I have ever been as impressed by a deal team as I have been by Acuity. You made it look and sound easy…” –Company / Shareholder Tax CPA
RF MacDonald and its shareholders engaged with Acuity to assist with the endeavor, including:
- Conducting an initial assessment of the Company’s fair market value;
- Modeling the feasibility of several possible transaction structures and methods of financing;
- Partnering with legal counsel to develop a strategy enabling the shareholders to involve their separate real property interests in the transaction; and
- Soliciting and negotiating multiple financing proposals from third-party capital providers.
After carefully evaluating several scenarios, the shareholders elected to pursue a sophisticated structure involving the reorganization and subsequent sale of the Company, together with a number of its primary operating facilities, to the ESOP. Ultimately, this strategy set the Company and its employees on the best possible path to sustainable employee ownership, while allowing the shareholders to realize maximum financial well-being.
“This structure added significant complexity, but Acuity and the team they helped assemble were up to the task and got it done.” – Jim MacDonald, CEO / Shareholder
For more information on this transaction, or to learn how Acuity can help you reach the right result for your business transition needs, please contact:
Chase Hoover, Managing Director at 714-380-3305, or
Michael Young, Vice President at 714-380-3302