Our process

Six steps

1. A first conversation

   We meet, with no obligation on either side. You tell us about the business; we tell you honestly whether it is the kind of company we are looking for. Most first conversations lead nowhere, and that is perfectly fine.

   An hour or two, once. Bring no documents, prepare no numbers, and sign nothing in order to have this conversation. We give you our answer, whatever it is, within a week.

2. A simple indication of interest

   If there is interest on both sides, we put in writing what we believe the business is worth and on what terms — in plain language, early, before you have spent weeks on it. You will not be led along only to find the price has dropped at the end.

   Three to six weeks from the first conversation to having the price in writing. It costs you a second meeting and a short list of questions, most of it answered with documents that already exist. Detailed accounts are not needed at this stage. It is also here that the confidentiality agreement is signed, before we look at the first accounts.

3. Getting to know the business

   We spend a short period understanding the company properly: its accounts, its customers, how the work actually gets done. We are careful with your time and your people, and we keep it as light as honesty allows.

   Six to ten weeks, beginning once the letter of intent is signed. It is the phase that weighs on you most: a full day with us, at the premises and on a job, on whatever date suits you. Two or three short meetings with whoever keeps your books. The rest is gathering documents that already exist, and that part need not be yours.

4. A fair price, clear terms

   We agree a fair price and terms you understand. We do not engineer the numbers, and we do not load the business with debt to make our return. Usually we buy the company in full; if you would rather keep a stake or be paid over time, we can arrange that too.

   Four to six weeks, overlapping the end of the previous phase, and almost all of it with your lawyer beside you. Two decisions are genuinely yours and nobody can take them for you: how the price is settled at the closing date, and how much cash stays inside the company.

5. Continuity at closing

   When we complete, the team stays, the location stays, and — in almost every case — the name stays. Your people keep their jobs and, in most cases, their managers. What changes on the first day is as little as we can manage.

   Two to three weeks settling conditions, and then one morning. It is contract and registration: a sale of quotas is made by private document, signed and completed on the same day, and registered at the commercial registry within the following two months. A treasury adjustment is normally left open, calculated in the two to three months afterwards, and the amount at stake is held back until it is settled.

6. The years after

   We do not sell. The business joins a small group of companies we intend to keep for good — and whatever we promise you about the years after, we are the ones who will still be there to keep it.

   Most owners we talk to are not looking to disappear. After the first few years there are three doors, and you choose: carry on running the company; join us in finding and settling the next ones; or take the time to bring your successor through properly. If none of those appeal, a seat as adviser is yours for as long as you want it. What does not happen is someone deciding, on a date fixed in advance, that there is no longer room for you.

   This step has no duration, and that is the point. What changes in the first month is little and it is always the same: there comes to be a board on which we sit, and a monthly report of sales, results and cash. Day-to-day direction will remain yours, and the calendar of the years after will be whatever you agree with us, not one already written.

How long, in total

Four to eight months from the first conversation to signature, and the difference between the four and the eight almost always comes down to the same four things.

It is shortened by having the last three years of accounts closed and reviewed by someone outside, by having one person deciding or every shareholder already agreed, and by having the property and the vehicles already separated from what belongs to the company. It is lengthened by the reverse: shareholders who still have to reach agreement, a property to be split off, accounts that need rebuilding before they can be analysed, and a tax or employment question that has to be quantified before anyone can take it on.

And it is always lengthened by the month in which the company is at its busiest. That is a choice of yours and not a waste of time: better to move the diligence phase than to do it badly.

Confidentiality

Whoever speaks to you will always be the same person, from the first telephone call to signature, and the two people who sign this page are the two who decide.

Nothing leaves your house in the first conversation: we will not ask you for documents, and no record will be kept beyond what you tell us. Before we see the first accounts, a confidentiality agreement is signed, and both sides sign it. In the diligence phase the circle will widen by the exact number of people the work requires and not one more: whoever reviews the results and whoever reviews the contracts, each bound in writing and each seeing only what falls within their own scope. Those are all the people who will see your accounts.

Your people, your customers and your suppliers will not be contacted without you. If at some point it makes sense to speak to a customer, it is you who introduces us, when and how you see fit. And nothing we learn will be used for any purpose other than assessing this transaction, whether the deal stands or not.

What we never do

We do not run an auction, and we do not walk your accounts from door to door.

The serious objection to this is well known and we concede it: putting buyers in competition reliably raises the first offer you receive. What the evidence does not show is that it raises the final price, and there is a cost that only the seller pays. At this size, the list of possible buyers is made up mostly of your competitors. A competitor who sees your accounts comes to know your margins, your customers and your prices, whether he buys or not. And a competitive process that opens and does not conclude leaves a mark on whatever comes next.

So we do not ask you to give up competition. We ask you to give it up only once you have a number from us in writing, and never before. If, having it, you want to go to the market, that is a legitimate decision and we say so without resentment.

Response commitment

We answer every message, usually within two working days.

A first conversation is private and carries no obligation.