Innovative Food Acquires The Fresh Diet, Inc.

BONITA SPRINGS, Fla., Aug. 20, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Innovative Food Holdings, Inc. (OTCQB: IVFH), a leading nationwide provider of specialty foods, healthcare foods, gluten free foods, and direct from source artisanal foods, to the professional foodservice market, today announced that it has acquired 100% of The Fresh Diet, Inc.  The Fresh Diet is the nationwide leader in freshly prepared gourmet specialty meals, using the finest specialty, artisanal, direct from source ingredients, delivered daily, directly to consumers using The Fresh Diet® platform. The Fresh Diet's platform includes a company managed and owned preparation and logistics infrastructure, including a comprehensive company owned network of same day and next day last mile food delivery capabilities. 

For the trailing 12 months ended June 30, 2014  The Fresh Diet generated approximately $24 million in revenues. The Fresh Diet will be operated as a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Company, and the transaction is currently expected to be accretive to the Company's earnings in fiscal year 2015.

The total purchase price for the acquisition of the business was 10 million shares of the Company's common stock plus the assumption of debt.  In addition, connected to the acquisition, the Company raised approximately $1.4 million of equity capital at $1.00 per share from accredited investors and institutions. There was no placement agent and no warrant coverage on the transaction. The capital raised will be targeted towards growth and expansion opportunities related to The Fresh Diet.  The Fresh Diet's platform offers the opportunity to expand into additional specialty food market categories including non-diet daily specialty meals, meal kits, allergen specific and additional platform based specialty food opportunities, in the direct to consumer market as well as in select foodservice markets. 

"We believe that the expansion of Innovative Food Holdings' platform to include the capabilities of The Fresh Diet's platform is an extraordinary opportunity for the Company," commented Sam Klepfish, CEO of Innovative Food Holdings, "As evidenced by our recent strong second quarter financial results, we are focused on executing and delivering on a specialty food platform based strategy which has the capability to expand sales with low fixed infrastructure costs. We further believe that the Fresh Diet platform, which includes both daily prepared specialty foods and leading last-mile capabilities, is a platform which is uniquely positioned to complement the existing platform of Innovative Food Holdings, enabling us to leverage the rapidly changing specialty food market and provide unique source-to-table capabilities and dramatically enhance our direct-to-consumer infrastructure and capabilities.

Justin Wiernasz, President of Innovative Food Holdings, noted "In addition, we welcome the deep industry knowledge and food operations expertise which the executive team at The Fresh Diet brings to the table.  We look forward to working with the entire The Fresh Diet team of professionals as we build upon their more than 100 combined years of operations, process management, marketing, franchising,  logistics and distribution excellence to drive future growth for Innovative Food Holdings and The Fresh Diet."

Conference call information:

• Time: Today at 5 p.m. ET
• Dial-in number: 1-888-438-5491 (domestic) or 1-719-325-2491 (international)
• Call/Conference ID: 7962271
• Replay number: Dial 1-877-870-5176 (domestic) or 1-858-384-5517 (international). Please use passcode 7962271 to access the replay. The replay will be available until August 27, 2014.
• Webcast link: http://public.viavid.com/index.php?id=110633

About Innovative Food Holdings  

Innovative Food Holdings, Inc. enables, through direct distribution and through an industry leading fully managed specialty food platform, the nationwide, efficient, seamless, transparent and cost effective distribution of high quality, direct from source foods, artisanal foods, gluten free, allergen specific foods and other high quality, niche, specialty food products across multiple food distribution channels in the United States.

In the professional foodservice channel, Innovative Food Holdings' platform manages the nationwide sales, sourcing and procurement, logistics, customer service and distribution of over 7,000 specialty food products. Many of Innovative Food Holdings' products are used on a daily basis by some of the approximately 40,000 leading professional chefs across the United States.

In the direct to consumer channel, IVFH offers products directly to consumers, through its website at www.forthegourmet.com. In addition, Innovative Food Holdings' platform offers a comprehensive white label perishable and nonperishable specialty food platform for e-commerce retailers and other retailers which are seeking to offer the nationwide, efficient, seamless, transparent and cost effective availability of direct from source, specialty and artisanal products, directly to consumers.

About The Fresh Diet ®   

The Fresh Diet, Inc. (www.thefreshdiet.com) is the nationwide leader in freshly prepared gourmet specialty meals, using the finest specialty, artisanal, direct from source ingredients.  The meals are delivered directly to consumers in 12 states, 44 metropolitan areas and 573 cities across the country using the Fresh Diet® platform. Founded in 2006, The Fresh Diet is also a Inc 500 company.

This release contains certain forward-looking statements and information relating to Innovative Food Holdings, Inc. (the "Company") that are based on the current beliefs of the Company's management, as well as assumptions made by, and information currently available to, the Company. Such statements reflect the current views of the Company with respect to future events and are subject to certain assumptions, including those described in this release. Should one or more of these underlying assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary materially from those described herein as "should," "could," "anticipate," "believe," "intend," "plan," "might," "potentially" or "expect." The Company does not intend to update these forward-looking statements. Information about third parties was supplied to the Company by third parties and we accept no responsibility for its accuracy.

SOURCE Innovative Food Holdings, Inc.