A management buyout has been completed at STL Distribution North America (STL), with a new name for the Elizabethton, Tenn.-based wholesaler.

Send The Light Distribution has completed its buyout from parent company Biblica, a global Bible ministry serving 55 countries worldwide. The deal was in the works for several months after Biblica announced plans to sell STL Distribution in 2010. Full terms of the buyout were not disclosed, although it does require full payment to STL’s 600 vendors.

“We agreed to assume all the bank and vendor obligations of the old company," said Glenn Bailey, president of Send The Light Distribution. "In total, those obligations are in excess of $10 million.”

Send The Light Distribution is one of the nation’s largest distributors of Christian products and employs 130 people between its 192,000-square-foot Tennessee warehouse and its Sparks, Nev., warehouse. The company’s Great Value Books division in Waynesboro, Ga., will continue to serve international customers.

“We have been looking for a buyer for STL Distribution since we decided to streamline our organization to really focus on our Bible translation and Bible engagement ministry efforts,” said Biblica CEO Doug Lockhart. “When the management team approached us with their interest to buy, we listened and are glad to have been able to work out this deal.”

The tag line of Send The Light Distribution is: “Our name is our mission.” The new name harks back to the origins of its former owners—U.K.-based Send The Light called the company STL Distribution on buying Appalachian Distributors from owner and founder Tom Torbett in 2005.

“Going forward we want to make sure that our name is a distinct indication of what we are about,” said Bailey. “We want to clearly position ourselves as what we are, a distributor of everything Christian.”

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