VEVEY, Switzerland -- Nestle SA, the world's biggest food company, said it has completed the full purchase of Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream Holdings Inc., said the Associated Press.
The purchase follows the 2003 merger of Nestle's U.S. ice cream business with Dreyer's, which resulted in the Swiss company owning 67% of the combined business.
Also taking into account its proposed acquisition of Greece's Delta Ice Cream SA, Nestle said it "has now achieved clear global leadership in ice cream, with a 17.5% world market share."
The purchase is "the culmination of a long-standing strategy to achieve leadership in the world's largest ice cream market," said Nestle Chairman and CEO Peter Brabeck-Letmathe. "I am also very pleased with market share performance in other markets which, coupled with Dreyer's success, has brought Nestle to the global leadership position for the first time."
Oakland, Calif.-based Dreyer's makes ice cream under its namesake and Edy's brands, and also distributes Healthy Choice and Haagen-Dazs brands.
Separately, Nestle USA said that it has selected Tom Zosel Associates (TZA), which provides cost-cutting solutions for distribution environments, to support its logistics operations and the associated storage complexity.
TZA will take a deep look at Nestle USA's operations and will develop recommendations aimed at sharpening operational efficiency. The implementation of the distribution best practices program will enable Nestle to identify hidden operational costs and further improve service and accuracy.
The program will review and compare processes in all warehousing stages of Nestle's distribution operations, including receiving, putaway and replenishment, case picking, pallet picking, loading and shipping. It will develop and implement a distribution optimization program focused on reducing equipment and labor costs while improving storage capacity and throughput. A review of the WMS functionality, including analysis of inventory levels and turns, SKU counts, order profile by product line, current layout and slotting methodologies with further minimize operational costs by improving productivity and order accuracy while reducing order fill times, cycle times and product damage.
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