Europe's Largest Commercial Printing Group To Be Sold, With Multiple Factories Closed This Year

Recently, London private equity fund Leyland Partners is seeking to sell its majority stake in the Walsted Group, which means the Walsted Group is about to change ownership. As early as 2016, Leyland Partners invested £ 33 million in Wolsted, which not only helped Wolsted successfully acquire Leichem Printing Group in Austria, but also promoted its "stick to the end" development strategy.
Mark Scanlon, Chairman of Wolsted, said, "Over the past decade, we have maintained a good working relationship with Leyland. Leyland's intention to sell is in line with expectations, and this move will undoubtedly provide opportunities for new investors to support Wolsted's continued growth and help it continue to consolidate its leading position in the European commercial printing industry

It is reported that Wolsted has entrusted AlixPartners to manage the sales process. The process will be officially launched later this year and is expected to be completed by 2026.
Wolsted's Challenge and Strategic Transformation
While experiencing a series of mergers and acquisitions to expand its business, the Walsted Group is also facing the challenge of a decline in its core high sales market and has therefore closed multiple factories. We are honored to work closely with the management team of Wolsted to support the successful development and expansion of the group. Today, Wolsted has grown into the largest commercial printing enterprise in Europe, "said Ollie Jones, a partner at Leyland Partners
Wolsted stated in a statement that the company's executive team also holds a significant stake and "will continue to lead the group during and after the sale. According to the latest performance report, the total sales of Wolsted Group in 2023 decreased by 10.3% year-on-year, slightly below 582 million euros. Excluding paper costs, net sales decreased by 3.5% to 378.1 million euros. The group incurred an operating loss of 800000 euros, while the same period last year achieved an operating profit of 13.9 million euros.
Scanlon stated that Wolsted is seeking acquisition opportunities outside of its core rotary offset printing business to expand into other growth potential printing sectors. We are now turning our attention to the broader printing industry, which has growth prospects, can be scaled up through selective investments, is well managed, and can generate strong cash flow, "Scanlon pointed out. He also emphasized that this is not a quick fix strategy and may take until 2025 or even longer to establish a foothold in new fields.

The consolidation of the European printing industry is intensifying, and Wolsted is adjusting its pace
Recently, there have been significant changes in the equity of some printing companies on the European continent, reflecting the trend of industry consolidation: German private equity firm Capmont has acquired the European printing business of Quad/Graphics Group in the United States; The German Stark Druck Group was jointly acquired by Pentapart and Aurona Capital.
In fact, since entering 2025, Wolsted Group has announced the restructuring or closure of multiple factories to cope with market changes.
In January of this year, the Wolsted Group held discussions with relevant parties regarding the possible "large-scale" layoff plan for its only gravure printing factory, the Europhuko factory located near Barcelona, Spain. The Orohuko factory and its sister rotary offset printing factory, Carousel, located near Madrid, jointly form the Wolsted Iberia business.

The Orohuko factory covers an area of 40000 square meters, and the total factory area of the two factories is 22500 square meters. Four years ago, the Wolsted Group invested 4 million euros to introduce the Manroland Goss Lithoman IIIS short web printing machine from the bankrupt German printing factory, achieving diversification of the factory's products. At present, the factory has four 2.7 meter wide gravure printing machines.
In early March, Wolsted Group announced plans to close its other rotary offset printing factory on the European continent - the Austrian NP Drucker factory located in western Vienna - by the end of this year. The Wolsted Group acquired the NP Drucker business from the Lower Austrian State Press Printing and Publishing Group in 2018 and incorporated it into the Wolsted Lycam Group. Since the acquisition, the business scale of NP Drucker factory has been reduced from the initial four rotary offset printing machines (including one 48pp printing machine) to only two 16pp rotary offset printing machines and related auxiliary equipment.
In April, Wolsted Group confirmed its plan to close its printing factory in York, UK, and is currently in negotiations with 19 employees of the factory regarding this matter. The factory has been facing natural gas and electricity supply issues since last summer, resulting in production being halted at the end of June 2024. The future fate of the factory has been uncertain before, accompanied by a series of ordinary events.
The root cause of the closure of the York factory lies in the energy supply issue of the previously used 'hangar two'. Previously, Wolsted Group had relinquished the operating rights of its sister factory, "Hangar One," in August 2023. Subsequently, Linda Bois took over "Hangar One" as the office space for her new rotary offset printing business "York Media", while "Hangar One" was responsible for the installation of the main meters. Due to restrictions in restoring independent energy supply to Hangar 2, production at the Wolsted York factory was forced to cease at the end of June 2024.
Debbie Reed, CEO of Wolsted UK, confirmed the group's plan to close the factory. She stated that the group has been working hard for the past nine months to restore necessary energy supply, but due to serious delays in the installation of high-voltage power sources, the group has ultimately decided to close the factory based on the negotiated results and regrets the potential financial losses caused as a result.