I had almost forgot that Hillenbrand Inc., the former parent company of Batesville, had itself agreed to be sold to Lone Star Funds last August (2025).  I was reminded of that transaction from this recent update in Financier Worldwide.

The $3.8 billion transaction “will take Hillenbrand private and marks a significant strategic shift for the Batesville, Indiana-based company” according to the aticle.

Again, according to the article, “Upon closing, Hillenbrand will become a privately held entity and its shares will be delisted from the New York Stock Exchange.”

The article does make these comments about the future closing of this transaction:

“Recent developments suggest the transaction faces challenges. Several institutional investors have filed lawsuits questioning whether the $32 per share offer reflects optimal value, citing Hillenbrand’s recent revenue decline of 24 percent and adjusted earnings per share down 40 percent. Regulatory scrutiny also looms, with approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) required due to potential national security considerations. The merger agreement includes reciprocal termination fees and an outside date of July 2026, allowing time to navigate these hurdles.

Despite these uncertainties, analysts maintain that the acquisition represents a logical conclusion to Hillenbrand’s strategic overhaul. For shareholders, the offer provides a clear exit at a premium, though the timeline may extend if litigation or regulatory delays persist.”

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

Funeral Director Daily take:  Hillenbrand, with different ownership, will apparently continue to be a going-concern operating company, but for me it somewhat brings an end to the historical parent company that made its way in funeral service with a history that can be traced back to John Hillenbrand’s original casket company founded in 1884.

Over the years, since I was growing up as a funeral director’s child, Hillenbrand was synonymous with quality and at one time or another had the brands of Hill-Rom, American Tourister, Medeco, and Batesville under their umbrella organization.  I’ve been a stockholder off and on over my adult life, but did not own stock at the time of the Batesville sale or at the current time of the pending sale of the rest of the company to Lone Star.

Having a history of owning stock with the company has me wondering about the value that stockholders are getting at $32 per share.  The linked article notes that the price per share at $32 is a 37% premium over what the stock was selling for at the time of the this current sale.  However, if you go back to December 15, 2022, when the sale of the Batesville division was announced (the closing was in 2023) the stock price was at $44. . . . . and from my searching and the following answer from Gemini AI, stockholders apparently received no special dividend from that sale:

“Hillenbrand did not issue a special cash dividend to stockholders from the proceeds of the 2023 sale of Batesville. The company used the net proceeds from the sale primarily for debt reduction.”

So, if that is the case, then Hillenbrand stockholders are receiving a $32 per share price a little over three years after the stock was selling at $44 —  that’s a 27% decrease in value after the announced sale of Batesville.  I’m guessing that might be one of the reasons for the potential lawsuits, according to the linked article, about shareholders receiving “optimal value”.

It makes one think. . . maybe Hillenbrand should have sold off the rest of the company and held on to Death Care company Batesville instead of selling Batesville and holding on to the rest of the company. . . . .i.e. maybe Hillenbrand management sold the wrong company back in 2022.

Related —  Hillenbrand’s press release when selling Batesville in 2022.

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Since they sold Batesville in February 2023, Hillenbrand Industries has been out of the Death Care business.  But, if you are a long-time member of the Death Care community the name Hillenbrand has been synonymous with the funeral profession since 1906 when John A. Hillenbrand purchased the Batesville Casket Company and founded “Hillenbrand” where the casket business became the foundation.

However, Batesville was off-loaded from Hillenbrand in February 2023 and just this week it was announced in this press release that the balance of Hillenbrand Industries was being sold to an affiliate of Lone Star Funds or $32 per share which will equal an enterprise value of about $3.8 billion.

In the press release Helen Cornell, Chairperson of the Hillenbrand Board of Directors makes this comment, “We are pleased to reach this agreement with Lone Star, which delivers immediate and certain cash value to our shareholders at a substantial premium to recent trading, and positions Hillenbrand to continue meeting and exceeding customers’ needs for highly-engineered, mission-critical processing equipment and solutions.”

And, Hillenbrand President and CEO Kim Ryan makes this comment, “Over the past several years, Hillenbrand has made tremendous progress transforming into a pure-play industrial company, reshaping our portfolio, and making strategic investments in the business.”

Here is the website of Lone Star Funds.

Here is Funeral Director Daily’s article on the 2023 sale of Batesville

Tom Anderson
Funeral Director Daily

Funeral Director Daily take:  I grew up being the “funeral director’s kid” in our small community.  And, that designation had responsibilities that went with it that we learned a a very young age —  be nice to everybody, follow the rules, be polite, respect adults, and on and on. . . .

We were never the “cool kids” and the funeral business didn’t seem very exciting to our friends who liked the automobile dealerships and other exciting consumer products more.  But my dad always told us that owning the funeral home was “an honorable” profession and one could build a good life and business value “a nickel at a time”.

I can’t help have those thoughts when I look at Hillenbrand first selling Batesville and now selling the rest of the company to private equity buyers.  I’m no expert on the management of the company but when I look at the last couple of years for Hillenbrand it appears to me that they sold Batesville, which in my book was the “nickel at a time” honorable and boring cash-machine, and then as President and CEO Ryan stated, transformed the company into a “pure play industrial company”.

When I look back at the stock price of Hillenbrand, it appears that it was hovering at about $47-48 per share (according to Yahoo Finance) at the time of the Batesville sale and Hillenbrand just accepted an offer of $32 per share as a “pure-play industrial company”.  To shareholders that’s about a 33% loss in shareholder stock value in just the past 2-3 years.

I wonder if they ever think that they sold the wrong company when they sold Batesville back in 2023?

Another company that may be in the same boat?:  I look at Matthews International as another public company with somewhat the same dilemma.  They do about 40-60% of their revenue in their Memorial division which includes Aurora Caskets, Dodge Company, and Matthews cremation among other products.  In the company’s 3Q 2025 Report,the company actually reports $203 million in Memorialization sales with total company sales for the quarter at $349 million, making Memorialization about 58% of incoming revenues.

They also have a promising and potential fast-growing division that deals with electrode batteries and other indsutrial products.

One can envision a future where Matthews liquidates the perceived “dull” Memorial division to concentrate on the exciting and potential growth of what they call their Industrial Technologies segment.

Maybe I’m not your typical investor, but in many situations I have no problem saying “Boring is good”.

Here is information on Matthews Memorialization segment.

Here is information on Matthews Industrial Technology segment.

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