America’s latest business revolution is the consolidation of the country’s small independent businesses. Last year there were more than 10,000 such transactions completed for at least $1 million.

Here’s what’s happening…small, mostly family-run companies are increasingly becoming the acquisition targets of an army of publicly-traded corporations.

The target businesses include the following categories:
Funeral homes
Uniform rentals
Billboard advertisement businesses
Heating and air-conditioning services
Athletic clubs
Pet supply stores
Collection companies
Nursing homes
Laundromats
Video stores, and many more, far too numerous to mention here.

This means that you—as well as thousands of other business owners— will have the opportunity of trading your company to a “consolidator.”

Payment to you would be in the form of shares of stock equal to five or six times your annual cash flow. And it’s not unusual to also structure the deal so that you continue to be the operator/manager, if you so choose.

What would be the advantage to you under such a trade?

Your Options Are Expanded Under Such An Arrangement

You’d own part of a publicly-traded corporation where shares are easily traded. As the corporation acquires more and more companies, through buy-outs, they are able to gain greater purchasing efficiencies and wider marketing power.

As their earnings expand, the company is more profitable—which transposes into higher stock prices. Stocks that you now own. So regardless of where you are now with your business, it’s nice to know that his new “revolution” exists. It may afford you an option, another way to “cash out” when you choose to do so.

And remember, because the price you will receive for your company is dependent upon its income and cash flow, the key for the greatest sales price possible is to increase these figures.

A powerful way to quickly do so is to become a smart barterer—every dollar you bring to your bottomline is multiplied by five when you sell the company.

We have a report, “Think Barter & Grow Richer” that goes into the publicly-traded companies “arena.” See right-hand column, bottom of the page, “Top Resources.”

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 17th, 2007 at 1:31 am and is filed under Entrepreneurs & Small Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.