Exit Planning

Exit planning refers to the process of determining the best route for selling or transferring a business to successors while also ensuring the business owner’s comfortable retirement.

Creating an exit plan should precede the business owner’s exit by at least 5 to 10 years and requires several advisors, including a Certified Business Exit Consultant (CBEC) ® to “quarterback” the process, an Attorney, Certified Public Accountant (CPA,) Certified Financial Planner (CFP,) ® Chartered Life Underwriter (CLU,) ® Certified Management Consultant (CMC,) ® and others to help the business owner visualize their best exit and succession strategies. Of course, the earlier you start to plan the better.

96% of business owners agree that having both an exit and succession plan are important for the future, yet 87% have neither. Because 66% of the privately held businesses are owned by Baby Boomers, the majority of whom will need to exit their business in the next 10 years, just about every business can benefit from talking with an experienced Certified Business Exit Consultant (CBEC.) ®

Most business owners are not adequately informed, do not thoughtfully plan for their exit, and, consequentially, leave a lot of money on the table, as illustrated by these additional statistics:

• The average business loses 27% of its’ value when it sells, in large part, because it does not have a plan;
• 20% to 30% of businesses that go to market actually sell, leaving up to 80% of business owners without solid options for realizing the highest possible value of their business or ensuring continuity of the business into the next generation.

Not only do family members suffer when a business owner fails to plan, but so do the business’ customers, employees, and other stakeholders.

An owner who is informed and ready to sell their business, on the other hand, greatly increases the odds that the business will survive a transition to new owners and allow the business owner to retire comfortably.

Our comprehensive exit planning consultation includes:

• An opening conference to quickly get the exit planning consultant up to speed about the business, followed by a review of your legal, accounting, and personal financial documents;
• Several owner surveys to ascertain the owner’s “mental readiness,” “personal financial readiness,” and “the business’ readiness” for the owner’s exit;
• An “estimation of value” * of what the business could be worth. [* A formal business appraisal would be extra.];
• A calculation of the owner’s ability to comfortably retire after the sale of the business, or to identify the business owner’s “value gap,” followed by a discussion of possible solutions;
• A detailed explanation of the five – (5) different exit options – including the positives and negatives of each option and possible tax consequences;
• A customized exit plan that outlines short-, intermediate- and long-term recommendations for facilitating the transaction and improving the business; and
• One-(1) year free support to help coordinate the experts, facilitate the owner’s exit, and provide general advice regarding their exit transaction;

We sign a confidentiality agreement with each client, ask for no money up front, and guarantee the business owner will be satisfied with our services:

“Greater Prairie Business Consulting, Inc.’s performance guarantee to a business owner is this – if the business owner is not completely satisfied with this service or feels that this exit planning assessment falls short of the most comprehensive discussion they have had about exiting their business, there is no charge.”

Often this assessment identifies ways a client can be more profitable, so the client has nothing to lose and a lot to gain from talking to Greater Prairie Business Consulting !

The question is, how ready is your business for your future exit ?

Click on the below boxes and take our free assessments to learn about your mental, financial and business' readiness for exit: