COLUMBIA, S.C. — A Maryland company agreed Monday to pay $12.8 million to buy South Carolina's troubled Park Seed, whose seed catalog has been a small source of warmth during long winters across the country for more than 140 years.
A federal bankruptcy judge accepted the offer from Blackstreet Capital after frenzied negotiations in the courtroom and hallway of a Columbia courthouse that drove the best bid up $4 million in four hours.
Creditors were pleased with the offer from the Chevy Chase, Md., company that focuses on underperforming companies. But perhaps the happiest people were in Greenwood County, where Blackstreet agreed to keep the company's roughly 200 permanent employees on the payroll for at least three years.
If the firm doesn't, it will have to pay $1.5 million in penalties split between the estate of company founder George W. Park, the state and the county.
Source: USA Today
