Three articles about Charrette from years past (Service Point USA)

THIS POST UPDATED ON NOV 26, 2013 - SEE "SECOND SECTION" FOR INFO ADDED

Three articles about "Charrette" from years past:

Investment Firm to Buy Charrette

Sale of architectural supply company to close July 31



July 23, 1997 — Charrette, which opened 33 years ago as a small Cambridge store for architects and grew into an $89 million business, will be sold to Berkshire Partners LLC, a Boston investment firm that at various times has owned stakes in Lechmere and Papa Gino's.

Link to full article:

http://www.berkshirepartners.com/investment-firm-to-buy-charrette

Berkshire Has Designs for Charrette Corp.

August 18, 1997 — Berkshire Partners on July 31 acquired Charrette Corp., a supplier of graphic imaging equipment, supplies and design services, in a management buyout for an undisclosed price, said Bradley Bloom, a managing director at the Boston firm.

Link to full article:

http://www.berkshirepartners.com/berkshire-has-designs-for-charrette-corp-

Spanish Firm Acquires Charrette for $107M

May 6, 1999 — Charrette Corp., which opened as a store for architects in Cambridge 35 years ago, said it has been bought by Grupo Picking Pack S.A. of Barcelona. A publically traded company, GPP does in Europe what Charrette does in the United States – sells supplies, modeling software, and services to architects, engineering firms, and ad agencies.

Link to full article:

http://www.berkshirepartners.com/spanish-firm-acquires-charrette-for--107m

AND, AFTERWARDS, FOLLOW THE BOUNCING BALL….

Charrette bought by Jeffries Capital Partners

Thursday 18 July 2002 | 00:00 CET | News

Charrette (US), office supplies division of Service Point, has been acquired for Euro 21 mil by Jeffries Capital Partners. Service Point, which was formerly known as Picking Pack, will use the money to reduce its debt and to raise its consolidated gross margin by 14 percentage points to 64%. Service Point also intends to focus on the US digital reprography and document management markets, which have higher growth and profitability expectations.

Pitman Acquires Charrette

(July 2006) posted on Tue Jul 11, 2006

"Expansion into new, fast-growing industries."

Pitman Company, the Totowa, NJ-based graphic arts supplier, has acquired Charrette LLC, the provider of imaging supplies, equipment, and services to the graphics, corporate, and technical design marketplaces. Charrette LLC becomes a division of Pitman, and will continue to operate under the Charrette name; John J. Ford III, president and CEO of Charrette, will continue to head the Charrette division

"Pitman’s purchase of Charrette represents a major advance in our company"s strategy for expansion into new, fast-growing industries,"? says Joe Demharter, Pitman president. "With a strong sales, service, and distribution organization model, and an extensive product portfolio that complements ours, Charrette offers extraordinary cross-marketing potential. Charrette brings an extended industry perspective that can provide our customers with opportunities to explore channels for their business growth through an additional range of products and expertise."

Pitman is probably more recognizable to commercial printing houses, while Charrette is likely a more familiar brand among digital print shops, designers, and corporate in-house and agencies doing print work. Pitman has its own wide-format supplies division and, says Demharter, this division will be maintained to service its commercial clients, while Charrette will service its former clients.

Founded in 1964 and headquartered in the Boston suburb of Woburn, MA, Charrette has 22 locations with 404 employees. It offers 40,000 inventoried items and access to more than 100,000 products used in design and wide-format imaging applications. In early 2006, the company acquired Mile High Imaging Supply in Denver.

Agfa Buys Pitman

By Howie Fenton
Published: July 19, 2010

Agfa Graphics announced last week that it signed an agreement to purchase the assets of  Pitman, one of the few remaining independent dealers of equipment including prepress, inkjet, pressroom and packaging printing products. This was not a total surprise as speculation of a Pitman sale grew a few weeks ago after Kodak announced it would cut distribution ties with the company, which had been its largest U.S. reseller of prepress products since 2007.

The relationship between Agfa and Pitman is well established. Pitman was founded over a hundred years ago and has worked with Agfa for almost half that time. Both companies are based in north NJ and Pitman has 502 employees in 16 locations throughout the U.S. Agfa will retain the Pitman name for the business.

Agfa’s market will increase substantially, thanks to the addition of numerous product lines to its offering, including flexographic printing plate solutions for the packaging industry, pressroom products and value-added services. Agfa Graphics reports it will be able to complement its own developed industrial inkjet offering with the addition of a range of media, new inks and wide-format printing systems.

"One glance at Pitman's extensive catalog is enough to understand that we will considerably expand our scope," says Stefaan Vanhooren, president of Agfa Graphics. "One of the main drivers behind this decision was the fact that we gain a unique opportunity to significantly grow our inkjet business. Pitman's strong distribution network and broad portfolio of products and systems, combined with our leading technology, will provide us with promising growth opportunities in this strategically important region," said Stefaan Vanhooren, president of Agfa Graphics.

Agfa forecast its U.S. sales would more than double to over $500 million from about $200 million after the acquisition of Pitman.