Pet Food Maker Wellness Pet Could Launch IPO This Year

Pet food maker Wellness Pet Co. is planning to go public sometime this year, according to a Bloomberg report Tuesday (March 8).

The company is backed by Clearlake Capital Group, a private equity firm.

The company has three production facilities in the U.S. and the Netherlands, and makes pet foods and treats under various brands, including Wellness, Whimzees, Old Mother Hubbard, Sojos and Eagle Pack.

The company, based in Tewksbury, Massachusetts, seeks over $600 million in the IPO. That would give the company a value of around $2.5 billion.

Wellness Pet is working with Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Bank of America on the IPO, and the timing of it is not set yet.

Wellness Pet’s origins go back to 1926 to a bakery in Gloucester, Massachusetts. The company was acquired in 2020 for an undisclosed amount by Clearlake. It changed its name from WellPet last December.

Read more: Most Pandemic FinTech IPOs Now Trade as ‘Busted’

IPOs have been somewhat volatile as of late. PYMNTS wrote that the war in Ukraine was creating uncertainty. In the past week or so, several FinTech IPOs are underperforming.

According to PYMNTS data through Feb. 23, the PYMNTS FinTech IPO Tracker stands at a little more than 66 – a lot lower than the high of 171.

The average return among the 46 companies tracked has been a bit more than -27%. Most FinTechs that debuted since the pandemic began in 2020 have been “busted IPOs.”

PYMNTS data only found a half dozen that were in the black, and some outsized gains had skewed the data upward.

Bill.com was one of the gainers, and Futu Holdings was another. Upstart was a third, and had a strong earnings report earlier this year.

Others like Toast were down as much as 35% in the wake of new earnings reports, missing Street expectations.