Little appetite for Taste’s jewellers?
The jewellery business is on the market to fund the expansion of Starbucks and Domino’s, but it may not fetch the best price
The funding recipe at fast-food brands conglomerate Taste Holdings will be tested in the next few years as the roll-out of Starbucks gains momentum. Taste’s growth strategy is largely pinned on the roll-out of the iconic coffee brand and pizza outlet Domino’s. The initial funding for the accelerated roll-out of Starbucks — it has four stores — will come from the proposed sale of Taste’s jewellery retail businesses. But this process has only just got under way, and it may be months before Taste can secure an acceptable price on NWJ Fine Jewellery (acquired for R120m in 2008) and Arthur Kaplan (acquired for about R90m in 2014). However, in the interim, fresh capital of R120m will be raised through a claw-back offer. This is the fourth time Taste has tapped investors for fresh funding in the past three years, having raised R180m in a rights issue in August 2014, R95m in a specific share issue in April 2015 and R226m in a rights offer in September 2015. In the year to end-February, the ...
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