Could your business run without you?
Help for business owners, so the business keeps running and keeps its value, and when it's time to step away, you get to choose how.
12 questions, about ten minutes
Paid only by you
Dont Shut Down is fee-only. You pay a set fee for our work, agreed in writing before it starts. We earn nothing from a sale of your business, a referral to another advisor, or any product. We don't buy the businesses we advise, and we don't represent buyers.
Already listed it, and it didn't sell?
Your broker brought buyers and they walked, or the one offer fell apart. The Relisting Readiness Plan shows why, from the evidence, and gives you a plan to fix it before it goes back on the market.
- Everything in the Exit Baseline: earnings recast, range of value, sixteen factors scored, anything that could stop a sale, and whether a buyer could get a loan at the last asking price
- The listing read line by line: what buyers were shown, what they said, each offer, and where the broker's view and yours differ
- Why buyers walked, ranked, with the evidence
- The highest price a lender would finance, against the price it was listed at
- A plan at three levels: what made buyers walk, what pulled the price down, and the value more fully rebuilt
- Every step priced on its own. Do it yourself, with your team, or hire us for the pieces you want off your plate.
- A checklist for when it's ready to relist, with a lender table and a buyer objection sheet your broker can use
- Works alongside your broker, never in place of them
Sample plan: fictional company
A fictional company, so you can see exactly what you'd get
Built for owner-run businesses
Most owners we work with run businesses doing under $2 million a year, the kind where the owner is still the person everyone calls. We work with owner-operated businesses from $500K to $10M in revenue.
Based in the Chicago area. We meet in person across the metro and by video anywhere.
How it works
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Free: the Owner Dependence Score.
Twelve questions across five areas of your business. You see your score right away, and we email you a written read on each area.
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First paid step: the Exit Baseline, $1,500.
What your business is worth today, built from your own books, and what's holding the number down. If you go on to a full Enterprise Value Assessment within 180 days, the $1,500 is credited toward it.
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Then you decide.
Work on it alongside other owners in the Owner Working Group, go deeper with a full engagement, or have us build the fixes for you. Or stop there. The report is yours either way.
What's in the Exit Baseline
- Your earnings recast line by line, the way a buyer or lender reads them
- A range of value for your business today
- Where your business sits in the price range for businesses like it
- How much more it could sell for at today's profit
- Sixteen factors scored, with what it takes to reach a 4 on each
- Anything that could stop a sale, flagged
- Whether a buyer could get a bank loan to buy it at today's value
- How today's value compares with the number you have in mind, if you have one
- A written report and a 60-minute meeting to walk through it
Sample report: fictional company
A fictional company, so you can see exactly what you'd get
Why trust the work
We're new, so instead of testimonials we haven't earned yet, here's the record behind the work:
- 10 years in ALDI's national IT organization
- 1,300 to 2,400+ stores during its largest U.S. expansion
- Cutover lead for the first 7 divisions of a national technology transformation
- 1,200+ new, remodeled, and replacement store and training center launches
Every system had to work on opening day. That's the standard we bring to your business.
What that means for your business
For seven years I owned one process inside a very large company: getting the low-voltage cabling and technology into new, remodeled, and replacement stores, and making IT, real estate, and operations work together so each store opened on its date with all IT equipment and systems working. The date was set before I got it and it did not move. That is a service business model with a corporate badge and national scale.
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The job runs on SOPs.
Every step had an owner, a written procedure, and a fix for when it went sideways, decided and agreed as a team and kept current. In your business that means the way things are done lives in your SOPs and your systems, not only in your head.
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Vendors and crews answer to a schedule.
My job was to make every vendor and crew hit the date, and to know which ones needed a call before the problem, not after. You will get the same read on the people your business depends on.
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When something changes, I go see it.
Most of my job ran from the office, but when a process changed we went to the site to see it, test it, and document it, and I checked in on every location on a regular schedule. I do the same in your shop, your office, and your books.
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Bad news comes early.
I spent a decade telling executives that a schedule had slipped and what it would take to recover. You will hear what a buyer will see, in plain words, while there is still time to fix it.
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Problems get a root cause, not a patch.
When something broke, we found out why and changed the process so it did not break again. That is how a weakness on your Baseline turns into a step that stays fixed.
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The numbers get checked.
I reviewed and gave first-line approval on vendor invoices, and built the review and reporting process that cut the errors and made the spend visible and easy to analyze. Your add-backs, your contracts, and your numbers get the same read, because that is what a lender and a buyer will do.
What "CEPA" means for you
Mark is a Certified Exit Planning Advisor (CEPA®), a credential from the Exit Planning Institute. It means he's trained to look at three things together: your business, your personal finances, and your life after the business. He works alongside your CPA, attorney, and financial advisor, not around them.
Who you'll work with
Mark Kreuz, CEPA®, PMP
"My family's automotive business ran for decades, until the 2008 collapse of the American auto industry. By 2011 it was gone. I help owners get ready, so when it's time to step away, they get to choose how."
Free guide
The Owner's Transition Guide. The ways owners leave a business, what buyers pay for, and the questions to ask your CPA, financial advisor, and attorney.