A consumer packaged goods company founded by two ex-Procter & Gamble employees has made its first acquisition as it looks to steadily build out its portfolio of brands in 2022.
Cincy Brands, which Sean Lee and Andy Cipra launched in February, has acquired Vitabox, an online seller of more than 70,000 products ranging from supplements and personal care products to pet supplies and more.
The deal closed in March, and the companies have spent the last few months working through the transition. That process is now largely complete.
Terms were not disclosed, but Lee, president of Cincy Brands, told me Vitabox is an eight-figure revenue business that’s been growing at a clip of 43% over the past year.
Vitabox uses technology to source products from top brands at the lowest possible price and ships more than 1 million orders annually through Vitabox.com, Amazon, Walmart, Wish, eBay and Kroger marketplaces — all with a 99% customer satisfaction rating.
He said there's potential to grow the business to $50-$75 million in revenue in the next couple years.
“What we saw in Vitabox was a company that was growing exponentially with their own world-class team, marketplace solutions and fulfillment capabilities,” Lee said. “We saw this as an opportunity to buy a good business that's growing on its own and use that as the operational foundation for everything else we're doing.”
Lee and Cipra launched Cincy Brands after several years in the CPG and startup space. The two initially met on the Iams pet food team while at P&G, with combined brand work that also included Old Spice, Crest Whitestrips, Vicks and P&G Venture’s flagship brand Zevo. They left for separate opportunities and later reunited at Amify, an Amazon-as-a-service startup, before exiting in 2020 to build Cincy Brands.
Cincy Inno profiled the company shortly after its launch: The goal is to acquire and grow high-potential “better-for-you” consumer brands in categories like health care, beauty care, home care, pet and baby — brands making $1-$10 million a year in revenue but considerably smaller in scale than what a P&G or Unilever would consider.
"There are so many of these brands, and historically they haven’t been able to accelerate growth as fast as we think we can," Cipra said. "In this 'better-for-you space,' brands have found a following. They’ve connected with consumers based on the positioning they’re taking."
Vitabox, which launched in 2019, was incubated by Wilbur Labs, a San Francisco-based startup studio, that also backs Cincy Brands. Wilbur has made multiple investments in Vitabox.
The other connection: Vitabox operates a 25,000-square-foot warehouse on Cincinnati’s West Side, near the Indiana border. More than half of its 33 employees are based here. The rest of the team is largely distributed.
“It’s a little bit of a coincidence but helpful because Cincinnati is a huge hub for logistics. It's an ideal spot to be located,” Lee said.
Lee said a majority of Vitabox leadership will remain in place. Cincy Brands plans to help Vitabox expand its catalogue and will provide strategic guidance, domain expertise and funds to help fuel that push.
Vitabox’s marketplace — and fulfillment capabilities — will also enable Cincy Brands to rapidly scale other brands it acquires.
“It should act as an accelerator,” he said. “We’ve studied a lot of other 'rollup’ companies that have acquired a lot of assets but that struggle to streamline operations. This gives us the operational foundation in-house — with all the technology, processes and people in place. Once we drop in (other) brands we acquire, they should be able to hit the ground running without a ton of disruption.”
Lee said Cincy Brands plans to make at least two or three more acquisitions before the end of the year. Given current market conditions, patience remains a key strategy.
“We want to make sure (brands) we buy fit all the criteria, because we really believe in our thesis,” he said. “It's about quality versus quantity.”
