A CENTURY-OLD wine merchant business in Huddersfield has been bought by a West Yorkshire brewery.
Aspley-based G R Pickard & Son Ltd has been taken over by Wakefield brewery H B Clark & Co Ltd for an undisclosed sum.
Pickards will continue to trade under its existing name but will become a cash-and- carry and distribution centre for wines, spirits and Clark's own range of beers and soft drinks.
Clark's managing director David Garthwaite said that the Wakefield Road, Aspley, premises would become a "one-stop shop" for licensed trade customers by extending its range to sell confectionery and cigarettes.
The staff of 12 will be retained.
Mr Garthwaite said the takeover secured Pickards' future at a time when many smaller businesses in the industry were being squeezed out by national wholesalers.
The takeover means Clark's now has 11 distribution sites across northern England - including ones in Keighley, Sheffield, Hull, Newcastle, Stockport and Blackpool.
George Robert Pickard founded the business in the early 1900s when he opened a grocery shop in Moldgreen.
Shortly afterwards, a second shop opened at Wakefield Road, and in the 1930s, a third was opened in Birkby by Mr Pickard's son Bob.
