There's Always a Way to Sell Your Business

Doug Robbins

Description

Funny, entertaining, sobering, and informational "tales from the trenches" by Doug Robbins, a master intermediary who always finds a way to help owners restructure or sell their business.

Through these tales Robbins highlights:

• Best practices for working with accountants, lawyers, and bankers in forming up and conducting a sale
  
• Ingenious ways to increase the worth of a business before selling
• The importance of confidentiality before and during a sale
• Ways for family businesses to do what's best for both the family and the business

Sujets

• Lawyer
• Accountant
• Confidentiality
• Best practice
• Bank

Informations

• Publié par: BPS Books
• Date de parution: 22 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 2
• EAN13: 9781926645384
• Langue: English

Extrait

THERE S ALWAYS A WAY TO SELL YOUR BUSINESS
THERE S ALWAYS A WAY TO SELL YOUR BUSINESS
100 Tales from the Trenches by a Master Intermediary
DOUG ROBBINS
Copyright 2010 D.M. (Doug) Robbins
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a newspaper, magazine, or broadcast.
Published in 2010 by BPS Books Toronto and New York bpsbooks.com A division of Bastian Publishing Services Ltd.
ISBN 978-1-926645-24-7
Cataloguing in Publication Data available from Library and Archives Canada.
Cover design: Gnibel Text design and typesetting: Daniel Crack, Kinetics Design, kdbooks.ca
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Author s Note

Tales
1 I m Going to Retire ... Maybe
1-3
2 A Vision of Tomorrow
4-7
3 How to Fill Those Sixty Hours
8-10
4 What s My Business Worth?
11-14
5 Shh - Keep It Quiet
15-19
6 Bankers
20-22
7 Accountants
23-28
8 Lawyers
29-35
9 I Have No Choice
36-37
10 The Coke Bottle
38-41
11 It s a Family Affair
42-44
12 Trouble Spots
45-47
13 Family Feuds
48-50
14 Partner, I Hate You
51-56
15 Failing to Plan?
57-59
16 Advisory Boards
60-64
17 Don t Cook the Books
65-70
18 When Is Enough ... Enough?
71-74
19 Sixty-Eight Hours? Not Me
75-76
20 Ignorance Is Not Bliss
77-80
21 Generation Gaps
81-84
22 Qualifying Buyers
85-90
23 Get Me Outta Here
91-94
24 Have an Exit Strategy
95-97
25 Selling ... Successfully
98-99
26 Fourteen Alternatives to Selling

27 And in Conclusion ...
100
Acknowledgments
I do a fair amount of public speaking - fifteen to thirty speeches a year. I always lace my speeches with tales to illustrate the points I want to make. In addition, I write many articles containing such tales.
So I thought writing this book would be a piece of cake. I assumed that with a concentrated effort it might take a week or ten days at the most. Given the many, many anecdotes at my disposal, I could just sit down, tell them to my dictating machine, upload them to my laptop, and then drag them into Word and print them. Done!
Little did I know that ten days would turn into almost eight hundred hours spanning more than two years. It turned out to be one HUGE piece of cake.
For their help and support during this lengthy process (and throughout my career), I wish to thank:
Marie, my wife of thirty-six years, for putting up with my entrepreneurial weeks. Many times those weeks exceeded a hundred hours. There were a few times (not many) when I stood her up at a restaurant or left her standing at a function because I was tied up with a client.
My son, Mark, for his encouragement.
Joyce Hansen of Class Act Connections, our public relations company, for prodding and pushing me to get all these tales into some kind of a book.
My staff, for their patience and support. They put up with all my talk about the book and they spent a lot of time supporting me instead of doing some of the (more important) things they felt needed to be done.
Mary Ann Matthews, for making sense of all the tales and putting them into sequence.
Last but not least, I really must thank all of my customers and clients throughout the years. Without their activities and real-life experiences, I would have no tales to tell.
Introduction
There are over six million businesses in Canada and the United States. Over the next twenty-five years, a large majority of these businesses will close, merge, amalgamate, be taken public, go broke, or be sold.
The purpose of this book is not only to get owners to consider and review the process of selling their business but also to give them a view of some of the things that can go right or not so right.
Selling a business is one of the most important decisions in a business owner s life. It is filled with excitement and numerous other emotions, including fear, anxiety, and uncertainty about the future. In many cases these emotions can cause an owner to build a moat, or trench, around the castle of their business.
There are only two ways for owners to get out of the trench. One is to be pro-active, taking charge of the sale. Owners of this type take the appropriate steps to build a drawbridge so they can exit the business in an orderly and timely way.
The other is to be reactive. Owners who take this approach have to be helped out of the trench - or be hauled out in a box - because they have done little or nothing to make other choices available.
Neither option is easy.
The reasons for selling a business are as varied and as complex as the owners. Here are just of a few of the questions business owners ask: What will I do with myself after the business is sold? Will I get enough money from my business to retire safely? What is my business worth? What about my family? My kids? Will the new owner look after the employees? Will the new owner treat my customers as well as I have? How do I maintain confidentiality about the sale? How do I protect my intellectual property? How do I find the right buyer?
... and the list goes on and on.
The purpose of this book is to give you an insight into the complexities of selling your business as well as a sense of the elements you need to act on to achieve a timely sale at the best possible price. Helping business owners sell is what I do for a living - and it has been my privilege to do so for the past thirty-six years.
I believe the best way to learn is through stories. That s why this book, rather than containing lots of instructional verbiage about the process of selling a business, informs you through case studies, or rather, Tales from the Trenches. These are true stories of business owners. Many of them did not have a specific business plan or an exit strategy. Some of them did. (The names of owners and the names of their companies, along with their locations, have been altered to maintain confidentiality - and in some cases to avoid causing embarrassment.)
Each tale in this book is told to illustrate a point or emphasize an issue of importance. Each one illustrates the humanity and complexity of an individual involved in this life-altering decision. Each provides an answer to the abovementioned and many other often-asked questions in very human and unusual ways.
So I hope you will sit back and enjoy my tales. (There are many more to follow in subsequent books.) I believe you may find one or two that hit pretty close to your own experience.
Author s Note
When you sell your house, you put up a sign. Along comes someone who wants to buy your house. You sell it. Everyone signs the appropriate papers. A month or two later the moving truck shows up and off you go to your new home.
Selling a business is not like that at all. There are so many more variables. These make selling a business very complex. For example, a lot of people will be involved in selling your business. It s not just you and the buyer. Selling will include any or all of the following: Accountant - to make sure the transaction is structured properly and the taxes are calculated correctly. Lawyer - to write up the agreement and ensure that all the terms and conditions in that agreement comply with laws, rules, and regulations that relate to the business that is being sold. Your lawyer is on hand to handle tax requirements on any statute law. He or she also has to ensure that the buyer is secure; that his warranty representations are reasonable; and that any deferred payments, such as notes, etc., are likely to be paid. Your lawyer will look for security on promissory notes, mortgages, and management contracts. Company Banker or Financial/Investment Advisor - to ensure that you take the money you receive and place it in an income-generating portfolio that is secure and meets your criteria to sustain you through your retirement years. Insurance Company - to determine whether your life insurance policy should remain in your hands or in your children s hands and whether it needs to be restructured. Employees - to make sure your employees are cared for. This can be an important issue. I ve had deals fall apart because the buyer wasn t going to treat the employees in a way that satisfied the seller. Other people don t care about their employees. If you care about your employees, then you have to ensure that your goals are not going to jeopardize them. They may inconvenience them a little bit, but not significantly. Spouse - to determine your family affairs. It may be that your wife or husband doesn t want you at home managing the kitchen. Many of my clients have sold their business and then come back saying, My wife/husband kicked me out. I ve got to get a job or go do something or get away. Children - to find out their personal and business goals. Most parents want their son or daughter to follow in their footsteps. That s only natural, but it s not always the reality. Everyone s different. Your kids may not want to work in your business. Family - to determine who is going to take the proceeds of this business and make sure they are invested properly. Psychologist - to help you ascertain how advisable it is for you to bring your children into the business. Psychology has reached a h