Pembroke VCT, the venture capital trust focused on building the consumer brands of tomorrow, has successfully exited its investment in Pasta Evangelists, which delivers restaurant-quality pasta direct to customers by post. The innovative meal kit business has agreed a deal whereby Italian firm, Barilla Group, will acquire a majority stake. The value of the deal is undisclosed.
Since 2016, Pasta Evangelists has been delivering boxes of fresh, high quality pasta across the UK, to enable customers to prepare five-star homemade dishes in five minutes, using only the freshest ingredients, and Italian where possible.
Pembroke VCT invested £2million in Pasta Evangelists in January 2020. Since then, the home delivery sector has thrived during the pandemic, as consumers have sought interesting ways to cook at home during lockdown.
Pembroke VCT has sold its stake in Pasta Evangelists as part of the deal with Barilla. The exit represents a 2.3x return in the twelve months since Pembroke initiated its investment.
“The Pasta Evangelists team overcame the challenges of 2020 and delivered significant growth whilst also adding key new members of staff. The whole team outperformed and clearly impressed Barilla with what they had achieved. We wish them all continued success in the future.
“We are positive about the outlook for the future as many of our founders and their management teams have found innovative ways of growing their businesses during the changing conditions that the pandemic bought about. We are also seeing a fantastic pipeline of new deals. We are seeing relatively early-stage businesses providing solutions for large corporates and the public sector.”