Entries by Apex Business Advisors

Case Study #25: Leaving Money on the Table

Nathaniel Broughton started Spread Effect in 2010 and sold it in 2014.  Spread Effect was a content middleman. In an era in which content is increasingly king – be it video, audio, or text, Spread Effect helped companies and agencies who wanted content placed or produced do so by working with an extensive network of […]

Key Questions to Ask Any Seller

As brokers, we don’t often have to prompt buyers with questions to ask sellers.  They often come with their own lists, developed from curiosity and perhaps articles like these.  While each broker has different questions they like to ask sellers, there are a few that everyone who is interested in buying a business should ask. […]

Real Estate Gives You More Options

One of the challenges we sometimes face in putting together the sale of a business is real estate that is intertwined with the assets of the company.  Sometimes that’s the perfect way to run your company and you shouldn’t change it. Other times, the circumstances are such that rearranging things would be too costly and […]

Why a Broker Will Take Your Listing

In previous articles we’ve discussed different certifications that brokers can possess, and we’ve also offered many profiles of our team here at Apex.  But sometimes sellers can forget that there’s a “good fit” process to our work here as well.  We’re looking for the right type of sellers, not just anyone with a business and […]

Case Study #24: Last Chance Saloon

Julie Nirvelli never planned to be in the food business.  She was simply someone who enjoyed making a good green tomatillo salsa.  It was so good, in fact, that her Mexican friends teased her, saying they couldn’t believe “white girl salsa” tasted so good.   After years of being constantly asked to bring it to […]

Why Do Sales Fail?

In a previous article, we discussed how long it takes to sell a business and how and why an accepted offer is only a phase in a multi-phase process.   Many things can intervene throughout the process to prevent a sale from closing.   In this article, we want to explore just a few of […]

Book Club #19: Delivering Happiness, by Tony Hsieh

Many business books offer solutions or systems or case studies to make their point.  Very few offer a simple narrative with lessons gleaned on the journey. Tony Hsieh’s Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose, happens to be one of those books.   It had no agenda other than telling the story of […]

Should You Grow Through Acquisition?

There are two ways you can grow your business: the fast way or the slow way.  What’s important is that there is no easy way. Both have their pros and cons, and in this article, we’ll examine the question of whether you should grow your business through acquisitions. Organic Growth If you have the time […]

Case Study #23: Wash, Rinse, Repeat

Tom Hannon had not one, but three exits out of businesses. Not just in the same industry, but in the same type of business. The original company was named FPD and it published and distributed free publications both to retailers and direct to consumers.   Think of any printed material you could see in free […]