Spanish food-and-drinks group Idilia Foods has snapped up UK milkshake business Shaken Udder.
Idilia has acquired the milkshakes business from its founders Jodie and Andrew Howie, and private-equity backer LDC, for an undisclosed sum.
LDC acquired a minority stake in Shaken Udder in 2021. The Howies will depart the business following the deal.
Founded in 2004, Shaken Udder is best known for its milkshakes, which are marketed as being free from artificial colours, flavours and sweeteners.
As part of the deal, Rob Reames, previously managing director of Shaken Udder, has become CEO. David Garman will step down as chair while Idilia CEO Xavi Pons will join the Shaken Udder board.
Shaken Udder is currently worth £45m in retail sales value, the joint statement said, while its revenue over the past four years has soared 91 per cent, with a 23.5 per cent CAGR, and it has added on 14,500 new distribution points.
Andrew Howie, co-founder of Shaken Udder, wrote on LinkedIn, "21 years ago, two young and naive university graduates had a great idea to bring tasty milkshakes made with real ingredients to festival goers, which was a great success.
"We then looked at the supermarket shelves and thought we can do better than the flavoured milk drinks on offer which had never seen a real piece of fruit or chocolate.
"So, a dream was born to create amazing, tasty milkshakes, made with real fruit and chocolate that would be available to all from the supermarket shelves. We couldn’t find a factory to make a milkshake good enough to meet our high standards so, we thought we'll build our own and off we went…
"17 years after launching on to the supermarket shelves we are the UK’s leading premium and the fastest growing milkshake brand. Currently selling 30 million milkshakes a year. Through pure determination we have survived many a storm in a category dominated by huge multinational businesses and overtook most of them on the way.
"Our new-born milkshake company has flourished into a fully-fledged grown-up brand. The time has come for us to cut the apron strings and let it go on to greater heights with the backing of a bigger business. So, with much joy and quite a bit of sadness we hand over the reins to Idilia to take this amazing brand we have created to the next level."