Business Exit Planning

Selling a Mats and Matting Retail Business

Is the economy still a little shaky for a business sale? Sure it is. Yet mats and matting retail businesses haven't heard the news and are reporting steady action on the business-for-sale market.

Personal and professional concerns surround the sale of a mats and matting retail business. In our experience, a common owner concern is how the sale will affect customers and employees.

The economy hasn't squashed the market for mats and matting retail businesses. Like always, unprofitable and poorly positioned businesses struggle to find buyers while sellers who have invested time and effort to prepare their sale are being rewarded in the marketplace.

Finding Prospects

Many sellers don't realize how many prospective buyers there are for their businesses. We frequently see qualified buyers emerge from the seller's network of business and personal acquaintances. In other cases, sellers take a proactive approach to finding likely buyers and contacting them directly. Competitors may seem like natural prospects and they are. The downside is that they won't pay top dollar and will probably absorb your company into their own.

Identifying Serious Buyers

If you haven't sold a business before, prepare to be overwhelmed by tire kickers -- seemingly interested buyers who lack the capacity, ability or desire to actually purchase your mats and matting retail business. As a seller, it's important to separate the tire kickers from the serious buyers as soon as possible. Each tire kicker is an investment of time and energy that could be poured into finding a more qualified prospect. Your business broker can offer insights about how to quickly spot tire kickers. As a rule, they limit the amount of information that is provided in the initial stages of an engagement, waiting to reveal the juiciest details of the business until the prospect has been thoroughly vetted. Smart sellers may require prospects to provide background and financial information fairly early in the process as a way of verifying the financial capacity to close the deal.

Maximizing Sales Price

There are no simple ways to sell a mats and matting retail business. If you don't know what you're doing, your business could languish on the market for months or even years. Fortunately, a business broker can minimize the impact on your bank account and personal well-being. If you try to sell your business without a broker, your time will be consumed by the details of the sale. Subsequently, you'll be distracted from the demands of your auto supply store, business will suffer, and the sale price you receive for your company will be dramatically reduced. For a lot reasons, a decision to hire a broker is almost always the right decision, especially for sellers who need to receive top dollar for their mats and matting retail businesses.

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