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Amare Safety’s founder is calling time on his nearly four decades at the helm, putting the Melbourne-headquartered personal safety gear distributor up for sale via PwC’s corporate finance team, Street Talk understands.

Sources said M&A partner Andrew Livitsanos has been tapped to shop the privately held business around. Early-stage discussions with private equity investors are under way.

Amare has been on the scene since 1985, supplying workwear, eye protection, gas detection and the like to businesses, emergency services, government agencies and direct to consumers from its online store and showrooms. Founder Geoff Pizzey has continued to lead it, expanding operations to display rooms in Victoria, NSW, Queensland, Tasmania and Western Australia, and entering the New Zealand market in 2004. It offers well-known brands such as 3M, Blundstone and ArmourWear.

Sydney’s Pacific Equity Partners would be a logical buyer, given the firm’s acquisition of industrial supplies group ATOM this year. ATOM sells safety and cleaning equipment, tools and the like to miners such as Glencore and infrastructure owners. At the time, PEP managing director Tony Duthie said the firm would set out to expand ATOM’s footprint, including via bolt-on acquisitions of smaller rivals.

Last financial year, Amare Safety increased its revenue by 10.3 per cent to $55 million, and lifted profit before tax by 30.4 per cent to $6.4 million, according to documents lodged with the corporate regulator. This has steadily risen from the revenue of $26.7 million and profit before tax of $2.3 million recorded in financial year 2018.

Read the full story tomorrow and more on the Street Talk page.

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