An investment group led by Lou Weisbach, a promotional products industry icon who founded the Top 40 distributor now known as HALO Branded Solutions (asi/356000), has completed the acquisition of the business of Waukegan, IL-based Top 40 distributor Overture Promotions (asi/288473), executives announced on Tuesday, March 2. Financial terms of the deal, which ASI Media first reported in November 2020, were not released.

Westbridge Capital, a minority-led Canadian private equity firm, funded the acquisition. Weisbach and his business partners Mark Serdar and Michael Nemlich, along with Westbridge Capital, are the owners of Overture.

Lou Weisbach (right) and JoAnn Gilley (left) have aggressive plans to grow Overture Promotions.

Weisbach and JoAnn Gilley, an original investor in Overture and the company’s CEO for the last 3½ years, will lead the business. The executives have an ambitious plan for growth and global expansion.

“Our vision is to create the premier international branding company to help organizations build global brands with best-in-class marketing, licensing and promotional products,” Weisbach said in a statement. “Our growth plan will be driven by both organic and strategic acquisition opportunities. We will be aggressive, yet selective, in acquiring companies in the coming months that not only build upon the Overture Promotions platform but add products and services.”

Nemlich and Serdar will help fuel Overture’s expansion plans by playing key leadership roles. Acquisition and strategy will be among the top focuses. “Our objective is to leverage technology to completely differentiate ourselves in the market,” said Serdar. “We are delighted that we share a vision with Westbridge Capital to create and build exciting new technology solutions.”

Gilley, a member of Counselor’s Power 50 list of the promo industry’s most influential people, added: “The Overture team is excited to officially start this new adventure. We look forward to adding new services and technology to support our customers and scale our operations, and to welcome acquisitions to the Overture family.”

Overture has been on a strong run. Despite the business and health challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, the company increased total revenue to $127 million in 2020, Gilley told ASI Media. In 2019, North American promo revenue was $81.3 million, good enough to rank Overture as 26th on Counselor’s most recent list of the 40 largest distributors by revenue in the promo products industry. On the Top 40 list, Overture had the greatest year-over-year (2018 to 2019) percentage increase in revenue of any distributor – 34.1%. The 2021 Top 40 list is due out this summer.

“Overture’s strong management team responded well to the challenges and changing business environment in 2020 and achieved significant growth in its client base and revenue,” Weisbach said. “After looking at many potential acquisitions, we decided Overture would make an excellent platform company to serve as our foundation.”

Weisbach, an entrepreneur and philanthropist, was Counselor’s Person of the Year in 1996. He founded HA-LO (as it was known then) in the early 1970s and built the firm over the years, taking it public in 1992. At one point, under Weisbach, HA-LO’s revenues stood at $740 million and the company employed 5,200 people in 55 offices in 11 countries. He no longer has any affiliation with the firm, which has evolved into HALO Branded Solutions. HALO is not involved with the acquisition of Overture.

Since exiting HALO a couple of decades ago, Weisbach has been active in a variety of ventures. Last year, for instance, he and David Liu of Harvard University founded Americans Joining Together to Beat Covid-19 Mission. He was also a founder of Stadium Capital Financing Group, which focused on financing in the professional and collegiate sports markets.

Serdar was a managing director at JP Morgan Chase, where he held multiple senior positions in the firm, including chief technology officer and firm-wide head of globalization strategy. He was also an executive vice president at Expert Global Solutions, a $1.3 billion business process outsourcing company. Additionally, he held management roles at Accenture and Ernst & Young’s Strategic Consulting Group.

Nemlich was the investment banker responsible for taking HA-LO public. Shortly thereafter, he joined the company, and was responsible for financial and marketing communications. He was also involved in the acquisition of companies, the structuring of deals and strategic planning.