Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By richards on October 25, 2012

At 10:59 p.m. on Oct. 10, Greg Rosenbaum received the official news that he would no longer be the chief executive officer of Empire Kosher Poultry, Inc., a company based in Mifflintown, Pa., that went from near collapse to prosperity and expansion just a year after his arrival in 2006.

Rosenbaum, who received notification that he had been ousted via letter and voice mail, described the circumstances leading up to his rem-oval as a disagreement between himself and the partners of Empire Kosher on the strategy and direction for the company.

Rosenbaum explained that he did see this coming in the recent weeks.

The disagreement began after the partners vetoed a complicated acq-uisition that he had been working on since early May.

I spent a huge chunk of my time negotiating this deal that would have increased business by 40 percent, its not a small thing to disagree about, he said. The tension between the partners and me was not an issue we would have been able to put behind us.

The alleged deal in question was the acquisition of MVP Kosher Foods, the second-largest supplier of kosher poultry in the United States, based in Birdsboro, Pa.

Key principal of MVP Kosher, Mark Honigsfeld, said that he app-roached Rosenbaum this past May in hopes of working out a transaction between the two companies.

When Greg and I met, there seemed to be tremendous synergism, and it made a lot of sense to proceed on some sort of acquisition merger and joint venture, said Honigsfeld, who now runs what is left of MVP Kosher from his Long Island home.

After that initial meeting, Honigsfeld alleges that negotiations began, with both boards of directors at MVP Kosher and Empire Kosher involved every step of the way. He explained that as part of the acquisition, MVP Kosher would turn over its farming relationships, inventories, birds and customers and would close down its Birdsboro plant the second week of July.

On Friday, Oct. 12, Honigsfeld said he was informed that Rosenbaum was no longer working for Empire Kosher and that, in fact, the acquisition would not be happening.

See the article here:
Greg Rosenbaum Steps Down As Head of Empire

Category: Jewish American Heritage Month
Tags: