Strategic acquisition by Ideal Shopping Direct

Inflexion Private Equity, the mid-market private equity investor, today announces an acquisition by its portfolio company, Ideal Shopping Direct, the leading independent multi-channel retailer.

Ideal has acquired Createtoday.com, the online portal enabling customers to create personal designs for greeting cards, postcards or wall art. Each item can be completely personalised using customers’ own content, and uploaded into a library from which consumers select their card design. Customers can then pay to download each other’s designs for use in home craft making. The deal was financed by cash resources within the business.

This transaction will help to deepen and expand Ideal’s already leading position in the UK crafting market, enhancing its technology platform and generating greater economies of scale for the business.

John Hartz, Managing Partner at Inflexion commented: “Inflexion is very committed to the future growth and development of our portfolio companies. Ideal’s acquisition of Createtoday.com is an excellent example of our work with management to identify and capitalise on opportunities during our ownership. Ideal continues to go from strength to strength and we look forward to working with the newly expanded company as it continues to grow”.