MONTREAL — MTY Food Group Inc., one of the largest franchisers in Canada’s restaurant industry, has acquired the assets of Timothy’s World Coffee and Mmmuffins from Threecaf Brands, Canada, Inc., a subsidiary of Le Duff America. The transaction is valued at $1.7 million.
As part of the deal, MTY has acquired 28 franchised and 7 corporately owned Timothy’s World Coffee locations in Canada, 2 licensed Timothy’s locations in the United States, 3 Mmmuffins and 2 co-branded franchised locations in Canada and the license to operate and franchise coffee shops under the tradename Timothy’s.
Le Duff America will continue to operate in Canada with its Brioche Dorée, Au Pain Doré and Michel’s brands.
“The closing of this sale completes Le Duff’s transition to a French-focused cafe-bakery company,” said Olivier Poirot, chief executive officer of Le Duff America. “It is also the capstone of a phenomenal year as we’ve successfully executed our strategy to refranchise la Madeleine and develop a U.S. version of Le Duff legacy brand Brioche Dorée.”
Le Duff America, which is owned by Rennes, France-based Groupe Le Duff, plans to open its first traditional U.S. location of Brioche Dorée in Washington, D.C., in October. The new restaurant will serve as a prototype for future U.S. locations of the global brand, which offers Parisian-style and urban French cuisine, with fresh-baked bread and pastries and housemade sandwiches, soups and more at over 500 locations worldwide, the company said.
In addition to the upcoming U.S. Brioche Dorée launch and expansion, Le Duff America has signed development deals for 111 new locations of its la Madeleine French Bakery & Café brand in existing and new markets.
