Gull Holdings’ newest amended offer to take USANA private, was apparently not well received by the board. After initially rejecting the $26 dollar bid a month ago, the board now feels that the amended offer, made by the Wentz family, through Gull Holdings is also not in the best interest of the company or the minority shareholders.
The board has asked the shareholders to reject the amended offer saying that it is “inadequate.” Myron Wentz who is also the founder and CEO of USANA, along with his family and others, control around 68% percent of the company.
In a regulatory filings,the company stated that they felt that the bid undervalues both the current shares and the future prospects of the nutritional company.
Apparently, the Wentz family, and Gull, will not be making another offer, saying that the $28 bid was the highest they could go to make the deal finanacially plausible. The Wentz family has also said that they will not consider selling their shares to a third party.
We have absolutely no idea who is guiding Wentz or Gull Holdings on this deal strategy but in over 20 years of being around and involved with public companies, we have never seen a worse attempt at taking a company private than this. Each step seems to be worse then the previous and aside from the negative press Wentz and Gull are receiving, they are creating a lot of friction with their own shareholders - who are equally as important to the company as their distributors. The strategy has been so poorly defined and executed that it amazes us this company has the market cap it does. Lucky for the company it has some great products to market and distributors who support them because they clearly lack the guidance to take this company private in a manner that appeases the masses.
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