Email
NEW YORK — Bed Bath & Beyond Inc. said Wednesday that it agreed to buy smaller home-goods retailer Cost Plus Inc. for about $495 million after getting promising results from a joint effort to put a specialty food department in some Bed Bath & Beyond stores.
Bed Bath & Beyond said it will pay $22 for each Cost Plus share, a 22 percent premium on its closing price on Tuesday. Shares of Oakland, Calif.-based Cost Plus rose $3.94, or 22 percent, to $21.93 Wednesday. Cost Plus, which operates stores under the names World Market and Cost Plus World Market, currently has about 22.5 million outstanding shares, according to FactSet. No job cuts or store closures are expected, Cost Plus CEO Barry Feld said in a statement. Albuquerque has a pair of Cost Plus stores and three Bed Bath & Beyond stores. Cost Plus and Bed Bath & Beyond had been testing a specialty food department at some Bed Bath & Beyond stores for the past year and a half. The tests showed the departments “could help generate in-store traffic and sharpen the edge against online retailers,” Feld said in a letter to employees on the Cost Plus website. So called “big-box” stores of all stripes are facing stepped-up competition from discounters and online retailers. “Our successful merchandising and product collaborations over the last two years have demonstrated that our organizations work well together and that we can make key contributions to the continued success of the combined company,” Feld added in a statement. Cost Plus started in 1958 as an imported-goods store called Cost Plus World Market in San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf. There are now 259 stores worldwide. Bed Bath & Beyond was founded in 1971 and operates more than 1,000 stores under its own name as well as others.
— This article appeared on page B1 of the Albuquerque Journal
