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Lab Safety purchases Highsmith

JANESVILLE — Lab Safety Supply in Janesville has purchased Fort Atkinson-based Highsmith, a direct marketer of library equipment, furniture and supplies.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but the acquisition of Highsmith is expected to add up to $30 million to Lab Safety sales in 2008, company officials said.

“We are pleased to be adding Highsmith to our specialty catalog group,” said Larry Loizzo, Lab Safety’s president. “They have built a solid brand position in the library and school supplies market over the past 50 years; we intend to build upon it.”

Lab Safety, a division of industrial equipment supplier W.W. Grainger, sells safety and other products to more than 800,000 customers in North America through a variety of branded catalogs, flyers and Web sites targeted to niche markets.

Highsmith, which has annual sales of more than $50 million, sells more than 25,000 products through more than a dozen specialty catalogs.

A Grainger spokesperson said the deal will widen the customer base of Lab Safety, which has traditionally focused on manufacturing equipment markets.

There was no indication what will happen to Highsmith’s offices in Fort Atkinson, but the Grainger spokesman said the company will try to hire as many of Highsmith’s 200 employees as possible.

Earlier this month, Lab Safety bought McFeely’s Square Drive Screws of Lynchburg, Va. McFeely’s is a business-to-business direct marketer of specialty fasteners, hardware and tools for the professional woodworking industry.

Lab Safety will market McFeely’s as an independent brand. McFeely’s serves more than 70,000 active customers including serious woodworkers, handymen, home improvement professionals, construction companies and cabinetmakers.