eCommerce M&A and Omni-Channel Strategies with Motis Brands CEO Rich Spratt

MOTIS Brands, led by Rich Spratt, is a leading digitally driven designer, manufacturer, and marketer of premium branded loading, hauling, and transportation products to a growing base of loyal enthusiast consumers. The company delivers outsized value to the consumer by leveraging its core competencies of digital customer acquisition, product design, and manufacturing. MOTIS Brands has demonstrated a proven track-record of acquisitive expansion having completed five successful tuck-in acquisitions across diverse categories, expanding its total addressable market while accelerating growth.

BGL advised MOTIS Brands in its 2022 sale to private equity investor Prospect Hill Growth Partners. The following is an excerpt of an interview with Rich Spratt which appeared in BGL’s recent Consumer Omnichannel Insider. 

BGL: Historically, your acquisitions have focused more on traditional sales models with limited or no digital presence. Clearly, you have a thesis that you can create outsized value by digitally transforming and activating these traditional businesses. What is driving your thesis around this strategy and how are you able to consistently replicate success?

RICH: We’ve built our MOTIS Shared Services model with expertise in each eCommerce discipline. This allows us to quickly and effectively digitize a brand or product line that we acquire, and we have a track record of successfully integrating and activating brands. As we scale the business in this way, we’re able to reinvest further in the shared services team creating a flywheel whereby we’re strategically expanding the assortment, building an increasingly strong shared services team to grow the brands, and then reinvesting further in both organic and acquisitive product line expansion.

BGL: Why have you pursued such a diverse channel strategy (own-site, online marketplaces, 1P, 3P, seller-fulfilled, FBA, resellers, etc.)?

RICH: To me, this is simply a reflection of the way we all shop today, and we’re responding to the needs and preferences of our customers. We believe consumers should be able to “Start Anywhere, Finish Anywhere,” discovering and engaging with our products through various digital and traditional outlets alike. We invest to create a tech-enabled multichannel solution that supports the “Start Anywhere, Finish Anywhere” vision, efficiently and effectively at scale.

Consumers commonly discover a brand on Facebook, get intrigued enough to go look at their website, jump over to read reviews in an online marketplace, and then come back to buy it at their preferred retailer. So, we feel strongly that we serve our customers best by allowing the customer to “Start Anywhere, Finish Anywhere,” but do it in a tech-enabled efficient and scalable way.

To read the rest of the interview with MOTIS Brands, as well as an interview with Kelly and Brian Douglas from Itzy Ritzy, we invite you to download our full 16-page Consumer Insider on Omni-Channel Benefits.

Are you looking to explore eCommerce M&A opportunities? Our eCommerce team, part of BGL’s focused Consumer Investment Banking Group, is prepared to help you develop a strategic approach. Contact John R. Tilson, or fill out our contact form below to start a conversation today.