Local investment company acquires Canderel's SA operation

Fore Good's managing director, Leat Sacharowitz says, "The Merisant SA acquisition complements our strategic investment strategy in the fortified, functional, and premium brand categories."

Internationally Merisant markets and sells low calorie sweeteners in over 85 countries. Its brands include Canderel, Equal, NutraSweet and Sucaryl. Merisant worldwide is following a two-tier concurrent reconsolidation strategy. It is focusing its resources and efforts on its top four markets and finding entrepreneurial investment partners in other regions to add value and support global leadership as both distributors and brand custodians.

John Cameron, Merisant SA's managing director, says, "South Africa is Merisant's sixth biggest market, finding a partner with a complementary skill and mind set was an intensive task. The deal was much more than just simply finding a distributor for Canderel and Equal. The partner needed a deep understanding in maintaining and growing category captaincy, representation with all accounts within the grocery food and non-food sectors and developing untapped opportunities in new categories and channels."

Merisant SA commands a 76.3% value share of the South African market in the low calorie sweetener category. Canderel entered the chocolate category just over two years ago and has seen exceptional growth since its launch. The company has also recently launched what it believes is a category breaker - Crystal - the country's first lite sugar. Made with granulated sugar, Crystal has all the taste and texture of sugar with half the calories and carbohydrates per serving.

Fore Good will announce its next major acquisition of 2006 in the next month.