I’ve often written that non-profits and charities world be well served by taking cues from the business world by developing practices such as performance evaluations and affinity marketing to grow their reach and fundraising capabilities, but acquiring public companies is not something I would have thought to suggest. But that exactly what UK-based Housing 21, a not-for-profit group that provides accommodation and care for the elderly, did last week when it took over care provider Claimar Care Group, beating out 10 private equity groups in the process. Housing 21 was even able to nearly triple shareholder value during the buyout.

As noted on Market Watch, Housing 21 saw the move as an opportunity to leverage Claimar’s capabilities and bring the caregiving aspect in-house: “Pushpa Raguvaran, deputy chief executive and commercial director at Housing 21, said the group had already been looking to grow and build economies of scale when Claimar’s advisers raised the idea of a deal in May.”

Obviously, the biggest challenge going forward will be how well the non-profit integrates the company into their pre-existing strategy and finds ways to streamline a model that clearly wasn’t successful in the for-profit world. While I don’t expect this buyout to start a trend within the charitable world, it does set an interesting precedent for other successful organizations ponder in the future, particularly given the extremely unpredictable nature of the marketplace. As in this case, sometimes the price (balanced by risk of course) is too good to pass up.

[image via Diego Cupolo]