(Filed Under wholesale Lingerie News). Playboy Enterprises, which today announced “a corporate repositioning to establish its parent company as PEI Holdings,” confirmed that PEI had recently acquired Phoenix-based Yandy.com, the online intimates and sexy costume retailer.

Unconfirmed reports of the Yandy deal had been circulating in recent weeks.

In making the announcement, PEI did not disclose a purchase price for Yandy, which had long been seeking a buyer. Nor did it disclose the annual dollar sales volume for the retailer. It merely reported that “Yandy has a strong, established, profitable business and an experienced team that is responsible for fulfilling more than 50,000 monthly orders of intimates, sleepwear and accessories to a primarily female, U.S.-based audience.”

Founded in 2007 by Chad Horstman and Evan Horstman, Yandy.com grew to substantial size, probably peaking about seven or eight years later. The privately held firm did not release exact sales numbers back then, but a company press release in April, 2016 claimed it had sold “roughly 2.8 million pieces of intimate apparel totaling over $75 million in the last two years alone.” And a Forbes magazine estimate in October 2015 put annual sales for that year at $50 million.

In October 2014, Monroe Capital, which describes itself as a middle market lender, “announced it acted as sole lead arranger and administrative agent on a $24.5 million senior credit facility to support the acquisition of a consumer products retail company by private equity sponsor, SPK Capital LLC. Based in the Southwest, the company is one of the leading online retail suppliers of women’s specialty apparel.” As of a recent SEC filing, Monroe still listed Yandy Holding LLC on its consolidated schedule of investments.

In the current announcement, PEI Holdings said it plans to “become an owner, incubator and investor in multiple global lifestyle brands focused on four consumer categories: sexual wellness, apparel & accessories, home & hospitality and beauty & skincare. In addition, the company will build, buy and invest in product development, marketing and distribution infrastructure to accelerate the growth of its brands.”

Referring to the Yandy acquisition, it added, “Coupled with Playboy’s long and successful history in the domestic and international licensed consumer products business, the acquisition of Yandy will significantly expand the company’s direct digital audience reach, its e-commerce capabilities and back-end infrastructure.”

Ben Kohn, CEO of PEI Holdings and CEO of Playboy Enterprises, said of the recent moves, “Establishing a holding company allows us to take advantage of the tremendous power of the Playboy brand to serve as a platform to launch and nurture other brands. We’re excited to partner with the talented Yandy team to continue delivering value to their dedicated consumers and to accelerate the growth of all of our businesses with new shared capabilities.”

Aras Koktas and Jeff Watton, co-CEOs of Yandy added a statement: “We’re very proud of Yandy’s growth over the past 13 years and consider this partnership with PEI Holdings to be our crowning achievement and a testament to the hard work of all of our colleagues.”

According to PEI, “G2 Capital Advisors, LLC served as the exclusive financial advisor to Yandy Holdings, LLC in the sale process.” — NM

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Published 02-24-2020 by Nick Monjo