Optician chain Hans Anders may be sold next year

“Healthy growth”

“We are still in the early stages of the process and all options are still on the table“, Hans Anders Netherlands’ general manager Remco Boerefijn told business paper FD. He says a decision will only be made next year. “We are not in a hurry. Right now, we are experiencing a healthy growth.”

Its current owners, venture capital funds Alpha en Alphinvest, want to see how the company’s investment plans can be best achieved over the next few years, whether that is through a sale, an IPO or a refinancing plan. “We do not particularly want to expand the number of countries in which we operate, but to grow in our present markets.” He did not divulge the countries that will get priority over others.

Hans Anders, founded in 1982 in Rotterdam, currently has 390 stores: 250 in the Netherlands and 90 in Belgium according to numbers from 2014. The optician chain also has stores in Sweden and France and expects a 165 – 175 million euro turnover in its current fiscal year, which ends in January 2016.