Food distributor plans spinoff

BONITA SPRINGS — Innovative Food Holdings plans to spin off The Fresh Diet into a separate public company.

Bonita Springs-based Innovative Food provides chefs nationwide with specialty and artisan foods and its Fresh Diet subsidiary delivers fresh meals to consumers in 44 metropolitan areas.

“We believe the market value of The Fresh Diet and our profitable direct-to-chef businesses are not being fully appreciated or captured in Innovative Food Holdings' stock price,” says Sam Klepfish, CEO of Innovative Food Holdings, in a statement. “By establishing our direct-to-chef and direct-to-consumer businesses as distinct operations — each with their own particular business characteristics and dynamics — we believe it provides the best opportunity to maximize shareholder value.”

Shareholders agreed. They drove up Innovative Food's stock price by 13% on Thursday (symbol: IVFH; recent price: 76 cents).

As part of the deal, undisclosed institutional investors pledged $1 million in funding for The Fresh Diet. “We believe that operating The Fresh Diet as its own entity will provide greater transparency into operations and further establish its current position as the leading specialty food platform in the fast-growing direct-to-consumer, fresh-meal category,” says Fresh Diet CEO Bryan Janeczko in a statement.

“Furthermore, in connection with driving value in our company, our board of directors has also approved allocating up to $1 million for a stock repurchase program to be implemented in open market purchases from time-to-time,” Klepfish says in the statement. “While we continue to invest our capital in strategic business initiatives, we are prepared to be opportunistic in purchasing our own shares.”