Without much fanfare,

The biggest E&S show of the year opens next week. We hope to see a lot of you at NAFEM ’13, Feb. 7-9 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Fla. If we don’t see you in aisles or at your booth, please stop by FER Booth #1663. And we especially hope to see…

Two major doughnut and coffee chains have spread out to new markets. Krispy Kreme Doughnut Corp. opened its first franchise location in India on Jan. 19. The new store is in Bangalore, India’s third largest city, and the center of the country’s high-tech sector. The Bangalore unit marks the first step in the Winston-Salem, N.C.,…

Mexican restaurant franchise operator Alsea SAB has acquired exclusive rights to develop

UL has acquired Everclean Services, a food-safety auditor based in Agoura Hills, Calif. Everclean Services assesses and audits food safety, supplier qualifications, brand consistency and price integrity for restaurants, grocery and retail chains. It performs more than 40,000 audits on more than 10,000 facilities in North America, including many leading multiunit chains. The acquisition broadens…

A private-equity firm that already holds a majority stake in Peet’s Coffee & Tea has acquired Caribou Coffee Co., the nation’s second-largest company-owned coffeehouse chain. The Joh. A. Benckiser Group (JAB) announced a definitive merger agreement under which an affiliate of JAB will acquire Caribou for approximately $340 million. Caribou will remain based in Minneapolis…

The

John Birchfield, FCSI, the founder and principal of Birchfield Foodsystems, a foodservice consulting and design firm, died Dec. 29. He was 82 years old. Birchfield had a long and multifaceted career in the foodservice industry. From offices in Annapolis, Md., and Okemos, Mich., he designed foodservice operations and served as an operations consultant for institutions,…