Livingstone advises Design House on its acquisition of Leick Home

Design House (“Company”), a leader in the design and sourcing of home décor products, has acquired Leick Furniture, Inc. (“Leick Home”), a leading branded wholesaler and distributor of high-quality solid wood furniture. The acquisition was supported by financing from Fifth Third Bank and Spell Capital. Livingstone served as the exclusive investment banker to Design House by leading both the buy-side and financing strategy and execution.

“We are excited about the opportunity to add this well-established furniture brand to our offering of products. We see this acquisition as the merger of two, great Wisconsin-based companies, each with over 100 years of proven expertise; the combination of Design House and Leick proves a natural step in the evolution of the Company. Their focus on the E-Commerce channel and home décor make them a great addition to Design House’s business. We are two companies who have grown with the times and see equal value in continuing to expand on that opportunity. I look forward to working with and learning from the Leick team,” said JP Drevline, President and CEO of Design House.

Todd Witte, Chairman of Design House added, “We engaged Livingstone on this important acquisition to provide us with both M&A and financing advice and execution support. They over-delivered. We were able to leverage all of the capabilities of the firm, and had partners leading both aspects of the deal which led to seamless execution of both the acquisition and financing.”

“We are extremely excited about the successful outcome for our client, Design House,” said Andrew Bozzelli, a Partner with Livingstone. “This type of transaction represents a clear distinction between the full breadth of advisory services that we offer clients when compared to competitors. We are able to leverage our sell-side expertise to help clients manage competitive acquisition processes and provide hands-on execution support.”

Mark Birkett, Debt Advisory Partner, stated, “A key goal in all of our financing processes is to identify good lending partners for our clients.  We achieved that here with Fifth Third and Spell Capital as both lenders made it clear that they believe in the strategic fit and growth strategy for Design House.  Our competitive capital raising process helped the Company secure an attractive financing package that supports the planned growth of the Company.”

Godfrey & Kahn S.C. served as legal counsel and FGMK, LLC provided accounting diligence to Design House.