Paul Foy

SALT LAKE CITY -- Shares of USANA Health Sciences Inc. jumped Tuesday after its chief executive and largest shareholder offered to take the company private by buying up all other shares.

Wentz, his family and others already control about 68 percent of the Utah vitamin company's stock. He made the $135 million offer Tuesday through his investment group, Gull Holdings Inc.

Wentz's offer represented a premium on USANA's $21 stock price Monday. The shares rose by $4.82 to $25.65 after the offer Tuesday. The stock was trading at $61 in 2007.

Wentz said going private will save money and allow USANA's management to focus on business. His son, David, is president of USANA.

A USANA spokesman, Dan Macuga, said the company couldn't comment on the offer until it is formally submitted.

In a statement announcing his offer, Wentz referred to "pressures and distractions brought on by the public market."

In April, the company reported a 36 percent drop to $7.5 million in first-quarter profit because of higher costs and lagging North America sales. USANA sells minerals and vitamins through an army of thousands of distributors. It also sells powdered drinks, energy bars, moisturizer, shampoo and conditioner.

"We are pleased to make this offer to shareholders to purchase the remaining shares of USANA at a significant premium," Wentz said.

USANA's board will form a committee of independent directors to evaluate the offer.

Stock analyst Timothy Ramey of D.A. Davidson & Co. believes the offer isn't high enough, despite USANA's recent troubles.

"The sentiment has turned negative on multilevel marketers in general and USANA in particular," but the shares are worth more than $26, Ramey said.

Gull Holdings, he said, was paying around $40 when it bought 135,000 shares of USANA last year.

USANA has been embroiled in a messy dispute with Barry Minkow, an ex-convict turned self-styled fraud cop.

Minkow, who heads up the Fraud Discovery Institute in San Diego, has assailed USANA for its network marketing business model, once-soaring share price and series of flaps involving the credentials of top executives.

USANA sued Minkow for defamation and stock manipulation. Most of those claims were thrown out March 3 by U.S. District Judge Tena Campbell.

USANA was launched in 1992 by partners including Wentz, a microbiologist who spun it off from another company that made medical test kits. It has more than 900 employees, including approximately 615 people at headquarters in Salt Lake City.

Myron Wentz calls himself a citizen of St. Kitts and Nevis in the Caribbean, spokesman John Dillard said.

His Gull Holdings is incorporated at the Isle of Man in the British Isles. Another Wentz company in Liechtenstein, Foundation Sense, owns Gull Holdings.