Two embarrassed entrepreneurs are selling their mega-beverage manufacturing plant in Terrebonne. Olivier Primeau, who already owns more than 30% of the volume of water under permit in Quebec, wins the bid for $20 million.
• Read also: It’s war in the world of beer in Quebec
• Read also: Transbroue owes $8 million to more than 60 brewers and SMEs in Quebec
The transaction between Tristan Bourgeois Cousineau and Joanie Couture, a couple who made headlines at the end of 2023, and the owner of the Beachclub in Pointe-Calumet will be paid in shares of the Prime Drink Group, which is making the purchase.
This company existed under the name Dominion Water Reserves when Olivier Primeau bought it for $3 million in 2022. Since then, it now controls the Beach Day Every Day brand as well as 6 of Quebec’s 42 groundwater capture permits, or 36% of the volume.
The surface area of the Terrebonne factory is 100,000 square feet. It generates at least $20 million in revenue per year: Molson Coors brewed seltzer there until recently and many other customers still brew their products there.
The Triani factory, in Terrebonne.
Photo Agence QMI, Mario Beauregard
Primeau was already a customer of Triani. The Beach Day Every Day energy drink has been brewed in Terrebonne for several months.
“It’s an investment I’ve been looking to make for a long time. We are now in full control of our destiny,” he told Newspaper, Monday, in interview.
The 38-year-old entrepreneur takes advantage of Tristan and Joanie’s setbacks to expand his drinks empire. The transaction follows the sale of its music festivals to evenko and Groupe CH last week.
Prime Drink is now ahead of only one player, and not the least, in the beverage sector in Quebec: the giant Groupe Geloso and its brands Poppers, Pepito and Bulles de nuit.
Olivier Primeau, 38, is extending his tentacles into the beverage sector in Quebec.
Thierry Laforce / QMI Agency
The kings of legal proceedings
Tristan Bourgeois Cousineau, 32, and his partner, Joannie Couture, founded Triani in 2014. They bottled Italian wine themselves, which they sold in convenience stores.
Nine years and numerous acquisitions later, the couple have built a reputation as intimidators. No strangers to the courthouse, Tristan and Joanie have been the targets of at least 20 lawsuits in the past four years alone, either on their own behalf or on behalf of their businesses.
- Listen to the economy and entrepreneurship column with Philippe-Richard Bertrand via
:
They are also being sued by the City of Terrebonne, which accuses them of discharging their contaminated water with an unusual pH and excessively high levels of COD and phosphorus into the municipal sewers for more than 1,000 days in a row.
Transbroue, a Triani subsidiary which is not part of Monday’s transaction, filed a notice of intent on December 7 with the Office of the Superintendent of Bankruptcy.
The beverage distributor owes $8,293,661 to 79 creditors, including more than $100,000 each to eight Quebec microbreweries.
Transbroue’s total debts could reach $55 million.
Tristan and Joanie paid $25 million 16 months ago for the purchase of Transbroue and the Glutenberg, Oshlag and Vox Populi breweries. The Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec was involved in this transaction.