Mr Price to buy Yuppiechef

Mr Price Group has announced that it will purchase 100% of Yuppiechef, a privately-owned South African ecommerce business focussed on home and kitchenware. Yuppiechef was founded in 2006 with a vision to build a platform for the distribution of aspirational kitchen and homeware brands.

The business has two primary operations – Yuppiechef Online and a separate wholesale division that develops, and imports branded goods for wholesale distribution.

Mr Price said that purchase will give it the opportunity to gain access to a higher LSM customer base, enabling the growth of its share-of-wallet through ‘aspirational value spending’. We are very excited about welcoming the Yuppiechef team into our family,” said Mr Price chief executive Mark Blair.

“We are partnering with a market-leading business which has won numerous awards relating to both e-commerce and stores, and Yuppiechef has a proven ability to launch private-label categories which have also attracted industry recognition. The acquisition will allow Mr Price Group to service a wider customer base, Blair said.

“Yuppiechef will benefit from our financial strength to accelerate growth plans which include significantly broadening the product assortment into areas where we have well-established skills and expanding its physical presence beyond the currently limited number of stores.

We were early adopters of e-commerce in South Africa and our consistent investment has really paid off for us. Yuppiechef gives us another platform to escalate our ambitions in online retail and enables us to be strategically positioned for further growth.

Mr Price said the purchase consideration will be settled in cash and the targeted effective date is subject to regulatory approval. It added that the Yuppiechef management team will continue to run the business with the full support of the group’s executive team.