Keep Supply acquired by private equity firm

Josh Burch: Kanbrick acquisition takes place during warehouse expansion.

Drake Hughes: Operations move to downtown Springfield has been good for culture.

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Keep Supply has been acquired by Charlotte, North Carolina-based private equity firm Kanbrick LLC.

The financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed in a Feb. 3 news release. Springfield-based Keep Supply distributes industrial refrigeration parts and equipment for food, beverage, chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturers.

Josh Burch, CEO of Keep Supply, expressed enthusiasm for relationship with Kanbrick. He said that the three original partners are still equity holders in the company, though Kanbrick is now the majority equity holder.

“They very much believe in where Keep’s headed, and we’re excited to bring somebody on to help us secure the future we want – the future for our team – and the fact that we can also be part of that journey,” he said. “From our perspective, it’s the best of both worlds.”

Keep Supply is also working on a move into a new warehouse space at 3570 E. Sawyer Road, Republic, not far from the Amazon STL3 Fulfillment Center.

“The move to a bigger warehouse space is really in line with where we want to be five years from now,” Burch said. “We’re going to have adequate space all the way around.”

He said the move to the new 25,000-square-foot warehouse is anticipated in the spring.

Growth mode
The Kanbrick acquisition announcement states Keep Supply has had 62% average annual growth over a five-year period and has grown to 125 team members.

Keep Supply began in 2008 as Industrial Refrigeration Parts LLC and was rebranded to its current name in 2022, according to the company’s LinkedIn profile.

The company was the No. 2 listing in the Springfield Business Journal Dynamic Dozen in 2025 and topped the list the previous year. The 2025 honor was based on the previous year’s performance, and Keep Supply tallied $50.9 million in revenue and 97 employees in 2024, with 2022-24 revenue growth of 177.2% and employee growth of 137%.

Kanbrick’s acquisition announcement states the ownership team of Burch, Drake Hughes and Chris Langston acquired Industrial Refrigeration Parts in 2017. The announcement says Keep Supply serves customers across the United States and ships to over 70 countries.

“Over the past nine years, our team’s talent, dedication and commitment to being the best part of our customers’ day has fueled our explosive growth,” said Burch in the Kanbrick release.

Burch added, “Partnering with Kanbrick will allow us to build on that success and invest in our future to better serve our customers.”

Tracy Britt Cool, co-founder of Kanbrick, lauded the Springfield company in the release.

“Keep Supply is an impressive company that has carved a unique space in the industry through its diverse offerings, strong culture and relentless focus on service,” Cool said. “They have a remarkable team that’s delivered growth year after year, and we’re honored to partner with them to continue that success for years to come.”

Asked how the arrangement came about, Burch said he met the Kanbrick team a few years ago when he participated in a training program for CEOs put on by the company.

“Our relationship grew from there,” he said.

As the ownership team considered pursuing a partnership, Burch said Kanbrick was at the top of the list. The Keep Supply team respected Kanbrick’s team and culture, and the feeling was mutual.

“They understand for us that’s probably the most important part,” he said of the organizational culture. “They have the same respect, and that feels like a great fit for us.”

Burch said Kanbrick believes in where Keep Supply is headed.

“We’ve been so fortunate to grow so quickly,” he said. “Where we’re headed is an area where we’re ambitious about where we want to go – that remains true.”

The arrangement ensures that Keep Supply can continue to grow and scale, Hughes said.

“It’s about securing the future of Keep,” he said.

On the move
Nearly one year ago, in February 2025, Keep Supply announced a relocation to 117 Park Central Square from its 601 N. National Ave. location. Partner Hughes said at the time that his team was excited to be relocating to the city square.

“We trust our team culture will only stoke the fire of a growing downtown,” he said at the time. That culture has been front and center for Keep Supply, as explained by Hughes in a May 2025 interview with SBJ.

“Culture matters,” he said. “It’s a big part of the success that we have. People like to come to work, and they believe in what we’re doing. They’re excited for growth, and that feeds on itself. If our culture changed, that would be a risk.”
In an interview Feb. 11, Hughes said the downtown move has been as good as predicted.

“We’re so excited to be there,” he said. “There’s a great energy downtown. Our team loves the area, so we feel very fortunate about that.”

Hughes also talked about some of the pitfalls of fast growth in that interview, among them the bottleneck of trying to develop leaders quickly enough to keep up with the increasing size of the company and the need to develop a sales training team and to make tech team additions to provide data to managers.

Asked if there was such a thing as growing too quickly, Hughes replied, “I’d be silly to say no.”

However, he said Keep Supply has a good foundation to scale because of its previous investments and its intentionality about leadership development.

“We try to be thoughtful about five-year planning and consider succession,” he said at the time. “We look for risks and build contingencies to be prepared for them. We’re in a good spot to continue to grow.”

According to its profile in PitchBook, a research platform covering financial markets, Kanbrick is a private equity/buyout investor with nine investments and a portfolio of five companies. The PE firm has recorded one exit since its 2020 founding.

Kanbrick inked the deal with Keep Supply on Feb. 3, PitchBook reported.

According to separate Kanbrick news releases, its 2025 investments included Assured Testing Services, a Pennsylvania company engaged in corrosion exposure and environmental and materials testing; Laboratory Testing International, a Pennsylvania metal testing and calibration laboratory; Alabama Scale & Instrument Inc., an Alabama company specializing in industrial weighing, calibration and metrology; and BHD Instrumentation, a Canadian provider of industrial products and calibration services.

Kanbrick’s single exit recorded to date is direct sales firm Ohio-based Thirty-One Gifts, which ended operations in 2024. A report in media outlet Southern Maryland News Net cited strategic challenges for the closure. The company sold handbooks, totes and backpacks.