New Chicken Billionaire Joseph Grendys Rules The Roost

If you’ve ever eaten chicken branded under the name Koch Foods, Antioch Farms, Preferred Foods or  Rogers Royal you’ve helped poultry mystery man Joseph Grendys amass a billion dollar fortune.

When Grendys joined Koch Foods in 1984, straight out of Loyola University in Chicago, it was a mere chop shop with fewer than 15 employees – a one-room chicken de-boning and cutting operation.  Fred Koch, the company’s founder, enticed Grendys to join by offering him 50% equity in the tiny company.  Eight years later, Grendys bought Koch out and began to aggressively expand.

Koch’s size and Grendys’ near-complete ownership are necessary ingredients in the creation of a billion-dollar chicken fortune. The industry has long been plagued by low valuation multiples, which turned out to be a blessing for Grendys.  During the 1990s and early 2000s, when market caps often reflected less than 20% of annual revenues, sometimes due to avian flu scares, Koch took advantage of these depressed valuations by acquiring smaller companies — like BC Rogers and Sylvest Farms– on the cheap.

To read the rest of the story, please go to: Forbes