Peter Black Pharmaceuticals is currently one the largest manufacturers of store brand vitamin and nutritional supplement products for grocery stores, pharmacies and contract customers in its local market and has annual sales of up to €31 million.
The unit is part of Peter Black Holdings, which earlier this year divested its Direct Marketing business to Merck KgaA's Consumer Health Care unit, owner of the leading Seven Seas brand. It has been renamed Lamberts Healthcare.
The Peter Black group is involved in a diverse range of activities, including footwear, toiletries and cosmetics. The company was subject to a management buyout at the end of 2000, which returned it to private ownership, following a period of rapid expansion that saw it buy Ferrosan in 1997 and Hexel International in 2000.
Last week's acquisition is the second UK purchase in under two years for Perrigo Nutrition, which first invested in the UK when it bought Wrafton Laboratories in June 2001. The company claims to be the US' largest maker of OTC pharmaceutical and nutritional products sold by supermarket and mass merchandise retailers under their own labels.
"With Peter Black, we have taken an important step in becoming one of the UK's largest manufacturers of over-the-counter pharmaceutical and nutritional products," said president and CEO of Perrigo David T. Gibbons.
The European supplements industry is seeing increasing consolidation. Dutch group Numico has now got rid of all of its vitamin and mineral businesses while the new owner of Roche vitamins DSM is promising to grow the business.
Peter Black Healthcare had a 4 per cent share of the UK vitamins market in 2000 and was then the leading manufacturer of own-label vitamins. Overall leaders are Boots, the UK pharmacy group, and Seven Seas, owned by Germany's Merck, which both had a 21 per cent share of the market in 2000, followed by Roche (now owned by DSM).
The British are the most regular users of supplements in Europe, according to Mintel, and sales of £350 million (€510m) in 2002 reflect this popularity. Sales have stagnated at this level in 2003 however and the new European food supplement directive looks set to hamper continued growth in the market.