Flowers Foods, owner of bakery brands such as Dave's Killer Bread, Wonder and Nature's Own, has agreed to buy Chicago-based gluten-free snacks and baking mix maker Simple Mills for $795 million in cash, the companies announced on Wednesday.Simple Mills' products are available nationwide in more than 30,000 natural and conventional stores. Items include cocoa and cashew butter cookies; almond-flour pancake and pizza dough mix; crackers made of sunflower, flax and pumpkin seeds; pita chips with sweet potato and parsnip flour and more. The company generated net sales of $240 million in 2024, a 14% increase compared to the prior year, according to Simple Mills. The acquisition is expected to close in the first quarter, pending regulatory approval.Simple Mills will operate as an independent subsidiary of Flowers Foods and will continue to be led by founder and CEO Katlin Smith and its current management, according to a news release. It will maintain operations in Chicago, as well as Mill Valley, California, where Smith is based. Of 111 employees, more than half are in Chicago with offices at 435 N. LaSalle St.“With Flowers' resources, we will be well-positioned to broaden distribution, accelerate innovation and amplify brand awareness, while advancing our mission,” said Smith in a news release. “Flowers has a strong track record of fostering growth in its acquired companies while stewarding and protecting their brand promise.”Smith attended University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. She won an award from the university's New Venture Challenge accelerator program in 2014.After college at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Smith worked as a management consultant for Deloitte. She began having medical issues and stopped eating processed foods.“The difference was miraculous,” Smith said in an interview with Chicago Booth. She started experimenting with almond flour and other natural ingredients in a test kitchen in the Atlanta suburbs and eventually began selling her products on Amazon. Smith launched her company in 2012.Flowers, one of the country’s largest producers of packaged bakery foods, is a publicly-listed company based in Georgia and earned net sales of $5.1 billion in 2023.It bought Simple Mills to expand its offerings of healthier foods. "Simple Mills perfectly fits our strategy of adding compelling brands in better-for-you segments that complement and diversify our existing portfolio,” Ryals McMullian, chairman and CEO, said in a news release.The global market for gluten-free products is projected to grow from $7.7 billion in 2024 to $11.48 billion by 2029, according to a report from management consulting firm MarketsandMarkets.Many consumers are adopting gluten-free diets due to perceived health benefits, such as better digestion and increased energy levels, said the report last year.