File this one under "Saturday morning thoughts -- over coffee": It is still very clear that Pactiv is the 800 pound gorilla in the US, with its HeftyTM line of plastic-ware, even after yesterday's news. It was also clear, historically, that Pactiv could press both Dart and Solo to match its (generally lower) price-points, or lose share, in the US, at least. I think that will continue. I think Dart/Solo is fairly highly-levered, and can't really afford to try to "wait Pactiv out", to recover prior margin erosion. And my hunch is that Pactiv won't waste too much more time before touching up pricing -- to put additional pressure on the newly-combined company's margins.
Even though the Dart family says (officially) that by virtue of being privately held, it can take its time to get the integrated company's costs in line -- it may not have that luxury. Pactiv is likely to begin to cut price and steal share, just to force Dart/Solo's hand here. We shall see.
I may not post as many items here -- or as often -- as I used to, now that the deal is done. We will see whether either the Dart family directly, or the company generally does anything interesting about the special $500,000 bonuses, for example -- that might warrant some additional probing.
Stay tuned -- and anonymous tips are forever welcome.
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