Thomas H. Lee Looks to Celebrate $2.7B Party City Buy

Thomas H. Lee Partners might soon be lifting its own red solo cup up to have a party and cheer its $2.69 billion deal with Party City.

The private equity firm on Tuesday agreed to acquire a majority stake in North America’s largest party supplier from its current private equity owners Advent International, Berkshire Partners and Weston Presidio.

Those companies will hold “significant minority stakes” following the recapitalization plan.

Party City leads the $10 billion retail party goods industry, according to THL managing director Todd Abbrecht, selling anything from plastic “happy birthday” plates to scary Halloween masks.

It has more than 40,000 retail outlets worldwide as well as a network of approximately 825 permanent party superstores and 400 temporary Halloween locations.

“We look forward to working closely with the team at Party City to maximize its scale and vertically integrated business model to continue to grow its business,” Abbrecht said.

Founded in 1947, Boston’s Thomas H. Lee has invested in more than 100 businesses across a wide array of industries, from consumer and healthcare to media and financial services. Some of its success stories include Snapple Beverages, now the Dr Pepper Snapple Group (NYSE:DPS) and Dunkin’ Brands (NASDAQ:DNKN).

Managing director at Berkshire Partners, which first invested in Party City in 2004, said the retailer is in an “even better position today” and ready for its next chapter of growth.

Bank of America’s (NYSE:BAC) Merrill Lynch unit and Moelis acted as financial advisors to THL, while Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) and Deutsche Bank (NYSE:DB) advised Party City.