TheoDavies sell-off expected
By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer
The overseas owner of about 80 local Pizza Hut and Taco Bell restaurants expects to sell the eateries to an unidentified buyer in October in a long-expected transaction that would complete the sell-off of Hawai'i's historied conglomerate Theo H. Davies & Co. Ltd.
Jardine Matheson Holdings Ltd., an $8 billion British trading firm based in Hong Kong that owns the fast-food franchises under TheoDavies Food Service Group, notified the state Department of Labor & Industrial Relations last week that it plans to sell the restaurants on or around Oct. 8.
A sales price and the buyer were not identified, and officials with TheoDavies in Honolulu and Jardine in Hong Kong did not return several calls seeking comment yesterday.
Employees of the restaurants were instructed not to talk about the pending transaction.
One firm suspected as a prospective buyer of the restaurants is Los Angeles-based private investment firm Brentwood Associates, which has purchased stakes in numerous businesses in a wide range of industries. A Brentwood official yesterday declined comment.
The sale, which also would include a local Long John Silvers/A&W restaurant, would transfer all 2,289 TheoDavies Food Service employees to the new owner with "substantially the same pay and benefits," the seller said in its notice to the state.
Jardine over the past year has been refining its portfolio of businesses, and previously said it planned to sell select operations, including those in Hawai'i, to focus on core holdings in Asia.
In Hawai'i over the past eight months, the company sold its six TheoDavies Euromotors dealerships and heavy equipment distributor Pacific Machinery, and was negotiating to sell its roughly 80 restaurants.
The Hawai'i restaurant group would be the last piece of TheoDavies to be sold by Jardine, which in 1973 acquired a nearly 100-year-old company that used to be one of the Big Five businesses that dominated Hawai'i's economy in the plantation era.
TheoDavies was established in 1884 by Theophilus Harris Davies, who acquired a Hawai'i trading company in 1868 and expanded with the sugar industry.
Under Jardine, the company focused on automobiles, shipping, heavy equipment and food service as the sugar industry declined.
Jardine sold TheoDavies sugar operations in 1984. In 1996, Jardine sold what had been the state's largest shipping agency for many years, TheoDavies Marine Agencies. About four years ago, Jardine sold local Ferrari and Audi dealerships, followed a year later by its Volvo dealership here.
Last year, Jardine sold its six remaining dealerships (Mercedes-Benz, Jaguar, Porsche and Land Rover in Honolulu plus two Honda dealerships on the Big Island) to Las Vegas-based Fletcher Jones Motorcars Inc. and South Carolina dealer Gene Reed for $56 million.
Earlier this year, Jardine sold Pacific Machinery plus a Caterpillar dealership in Taiwan for $49 million.
Jardine is the majority owner of the publicly owned Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group, but has previously said it is not selling its stake in the Kahala Mandarin Oriental Hawaii hotel.
The British conglomerate's diversified operations are in construction, transportation, real estate, insurance, retailing and other industries. The company reported $628 million in net profit on revenue of $4.4 billion during the first six months of this year.
Reach Andrew Gomes at agomes@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8065.
