Advantage Solutions Reinvents Strategy with Sale of Jun Group for $185 Million

Advantage Solutions, a retail services firm that recently relocated its headquarters to Clayton, has announced the sale of its digital advertising platform Jun Group for $185 million. After years of significant growth and numerous acquisitions, Advantage has been restructuring by divesting components of the company that do not align with its primary focus of providing labor and services to retail companies.

Since Dave Peacock, former Anheuser-Busch President, assumed the role of chief executive at Advantage in early 2023, the company has sold off an analytics firm, a marketing business, a content management platform, and a software business. It has also reduced its ownership stake in a joint venture and divested a portfolio of food service businesses while consolidating five marketing agencies into one.

The latest sale involves the sale of Jun Group, acquired in 2018, to a Swedish ad company named Verve Group SE. Advantage relocated its headquarters from Irvine, California to the Commerce Bank Tower in Clayton in April. Speaking in an interview earlier this month, Peacock highlighted the importance of focusing on businesses where Advantage holds a competitive advantage and moving away from sectors already dominated by larger competitors. He estimated that about 75% of the company’s restructuring has been completed and aims to finish the remaining work by autumn. Peacock announced that the latest sale “largely completes” the company’s restructuring efforts and emphasized the organization’s future growth prospects.

Upon the deal’s closure, which is expected in the third quarter