Bruner, a trusted name in North America in the water treatment business was established in the early 1940’s and soon became a well known name in the business. Water needed for commercial, residential and industrial purposes was treated by this company. They had an impressive list of clients that ranged from government bodies to big companies and did impressive business. Water softeners were their specialty and they also excelled in filters.
However, during the 1990’s the water industry saw a change in the business scene as several large players, tired of organic growth, went on a spree of mergers and acquisitions to consolidate their position in the market. Many block buster acquisitions and mergers were hogging the news in those days. Names like Culligan jumped into the fray and began looking for small and medium companies to further their growth.
Bruner commercial water conditioning systems was an attractive proposition and Culligan after due diligence acquired this firm in 1996 since then all Bruner products have been sold by Culligan’s network of independent distributors. This enabled Culligan to tap the lucrative commercial water segment as Bruner was already an established name in this field.
Bruner’s acquisition by Culligan enabled it offer a fuller range of commercial products to consumers given the increasing demand for water conditioning from industries like food, hotels, and other manufacturing industries. This was a win – win situation for consumers too as they now benefited from Culligan’s extensive dealer network and Bruner products. Due to this strategic acquisition Culligan became the one stop solution for all water treatment needs.
Bruner had already earned a name for their commercial product and with the dealer network of Culligan the products became accessible to a larger market. With seamless integration of Bruner product line into the Culligan product portfolio, Culligan dealers can now focus on commercial segments effectively.
What till now was company that serviced the retail; household and bottled water segment Culligan successfully positioned itself as a major player in the commercial water treatment market. Culligan is now playing a major role in the commercial, industrial, household, retail, municipal and residential water treatment sector.
However, the transition was not as smooth as former distributors of Bruner had obtained an injunction in 1999 preventing Culligan’s distributors from offering Bruner products. Culligan successfully challenged this injunction and in the year 2000 the New Jersey State Supreme Court dismissed the injunction. Bruner distributors can access Bruner products from local Culligan dealers, the court ruled. Thus Culligan can now move forward and aggressively push Bruner products in the market.