I am thankful that Rua Associates assisted in my transition process. I originally hired Rua Associates to advise me on an internal sale that I had been preparing for many years. We had hired a consultant who did a great job helping us set up systems and developing a management team that could take over the business. My plan was to sell the business to my management team so that everyone who had been loyal to the company could be secure in keeping their jobs. When it came time to implement this plan, the changes in the economy, the business, and the management team’s lives made the internal sale option no longer feasible. Rua Associates confirmed this when they did their valuation analysis, market testing, and bank feasibility analysis and shared the results with the internal buyers.
Once it was decided to go to the market to find a third party buyer, Rua Associates started the process of identifying and screening potential buyers in a confidential manner. They had to screen out a lot of buyers without revealing our company identity because I had very strict criteria for who I would allow to buy the business. I did not want to sell to anyone who would try to merge operations and eliminate my management team and employees. This made their job much more difficult, but they understood what was important to me and delivered several good proposals from qualified buyers. Eventually we reached an agreement with a buyer we already had a relationship with and that we knew would keep our management team and employees.
Rua Associates played a key role in negotiating the transaction because they knew the market well from talking to hundreds of potential buyers and receiving multiple purchase proposals. They also understood our financials and where able to show the value of our company and address any buyer concerns with detailed information backing up the value.
My experience with exiting my business has made me realize that it is harder to get out of business than it is to get into business. Therefore, I would highly recommend you work with a firm like Rua Associates to help you through the process.
[This Seller’s contact information is available upon request].