S‑UBG Group invests in Springlane

Aachen/Düsseldorf — The S‑UBG Group invests from its SME fund S‑UBG AG in the fully inte­gra­ted digi­tal brand manu­fac­tu­rer of cooking and gril­ling products Sprin­glane GmbH from Düsseldorf.

Since its foun­ding seven years ago, Sprin­glane has focu­sed on the trend toward conscious and quality cooking. With high-quality content about cooking, baking and gril­ling, the online and social media specia­list built up a foodie commu­nity that is milli­ons strong. The close exch­ange in this commu­nity now enables the company to deve­lop tailor-made cooking and gril­ling products for its target group. Under the Sprin­glane and Burn­hard brands, Sprin­glane has been offe­ring its own products such as ice machi­nes, high-perfor­­mance blen­ders, pots, pans, dishes, pizza ovens, grills and selec­ted access­ories for two years.

Change of busi­ness model gene­ra­tes new growth opportunities
Until the begin­ning of 2018, the company opera­ted an online retailer with more than 20,000 products from renow­ned third-party brands at last count. “Our deep under­stan­ding of the indus­try and custo­mers enables us not only to deve­lop our own products and brands, but also to distri­bute them effec­tively and effi­ci­ently. This is the logi­cal evolu­tion of the busi­ness model,” explains foun­der and CEO Marius Fritz­sche. In April 2018, Sprin­glane swit­ched comple­tely to its own products; four months later, the lack of sales from third-party brands had alre­ady been fully compen­sa­ted; in April 2019, the company gene­ra­ted a profit for the first time. This success not only crea­tes confi­dence, but also new oppor­tu­ni­ties for growth, so that today exis­ting share­hol­ders and new inves­tors are inves­t­ing a total of ten million euros in Sprin­glane. “We will use the capi­tal to expand new busi­ness areas and drive inno­va­tion,” Fritz­sche says.

No midd­le­man, but full added value
Sales are made directly to custo­mers in a control­led manner via the company’s own web stores and via market­places in Germany, Austria, Switz­er­land, Italy, France, Spain, the Nether­lands and the United King­dom. Since last year, Sprin­glane has also been running an agency and media busi­ness for food manu­fac­tu­r­ers who want to build a digi­tal posi­tio­ning or streng­then their reach. Concep­tion, crea­tion, produc­tion and distri­bu­tion are all done from a single source.

Content instead of marketing
With its new busi­ness model, Sprin­glane addres­ses the gene­ra­tion of digi­tal nati­ves and accom­pa­nies them both before and after a purchase. Seve­ral million times a day, poten­tial custo­mers look at the self-produ­­ced recipes and cooking instruc­tions online. About half of all users of their own food blog return regularly.

“Sprin­glane has crea­ted the basis to grow profi­ta­bly in an exci­ting market with convin­cing products and the successful trans­for­ma­tion to a direct sales approach with its own products,” said Bern­hard Kugel, CEO of S‑UBG Group. “In addi­tion, we have come to know Marius Fritz­sche as a strong entre­pre­neur who, toge­ther with his dyna­mic team, is consis­t­ently driving the deve­lo­p­ment of the busi­ness” adds Günther Bogen­rie­der, who over­sees the company as an invest­ment mana­ger on the part of S‑UBG.

About the S‑UBG Group
The S‑UBG Group, Aachen, has been the leading part­ner for over 30 years in the provi­sion of
Equity capi­tal for estab­lished medium-sized compa­nies (S‑UBG AG) and young, tech­­no­­logy-orien­­ted start-ups (S‑VC GmbH) in the econo­mic regi­ons of Aachen, Krefeld and Mönchen­glad­bach. S‑UBG AG invests in growth sectors; high quality of corpo­rate manage­ment is a key invest­ment criter­ion for the invest­ment company. In 1997, the share­hol­der savings banks estab­lished an early-stage fund under S‑VC GmbH to finance startups.

In 2018, toge­ther with Spar­kasse Aachen, Kreis­spar­kasse Heins­berg, Stadt­spar­kasse Mönchen­glad­bach, NRW.BANK and DSA Invest GmbH, Seed Fonds III für die Region Aachen & Mönchen­glad­bach GmbH & Co. KG was laun­ched, provi­ding around 21.5 million euros in seed capi­tal for the start-up scene in the region. As the succes­sor to the two fully finan­ced seed funds, it stimu­la­tes the deve­lo­p­ment of future-orien­­ted tech­no­lo­gies in the Aachen econo­mic region and was exten­ded to the Mönchen­glad­bach region in 2018. The S‑UBG Group curr­ently holds stakes in over 40 compa­nies in the region, giving it a top posi­tion in the Spar­­kas­­sen-Finanz Group. www.s‑ubg.de; www.seedfonds-aachen.de