Ecolab Inc. has sold the U.S. bathroom-cleaning business it recently bought from Swisher Hygiene.
The bathroom division, which generated about $28 million a year in sales, was sold to Enviro-Master International for an undisclosed price, officials announced Wednesday.
Ecolab officials said they expect to retain the rest of the U.S. assets purchased from Swisher in November 2015. Those assets include cleaning and sanitizing products that are sold to hospitality and health care customers.
Those products fit well with St. Paul-based Ecolab, which makes sanitizing, cleaning and other chemicals for the hospitality, education and oil sectors.
Details about what prompted the sale of the bathroom-cleaning unit were not immediately available.
The bathroom-cleaning business provided an important service to the marketplace, "but was not a good fit with our long-term goals and objectives," said Bob Sherwood, general manager of Ecolab's Institutional North America business. "We thank the team for their efforts and wish them the best moving forward with Enviro-Master."
In 2015, Ecolab had $13.5 billion in revenue and about 47,000 employees in 170 countries.
Dee DePass • 612-673-7725
