01935 584 024 james@sharpendequity.com

Helping business owners to exit their companies

Business owners can go and live life and have new experiences, while retaining the legacy of a lifetime’s work

We help business owners in the Manufacturing Sector to exit their companies through the acquisition of up to 100% of the shares in their company, along with the assets of the business.

It may be that you’re looking to retire or that your family has commitments outside of your business and is unable to take on the serious responsibilities of taking over your business. Maybe you have more pressing needs and really want to exit your company.

Very often, the companies we come across have been in business for a long time, have developed a strong and loyal customer base and have a highly knowledgeable and experienced workforce.

We promise to maintain those strong customer relationships, to retain all employees within the business’s existing premises.

Specific products and services of experience include:

Large-scale
sandwich manufacture

Large-scale
meat pie
production

Europe-wide
food ingredients production

Global car
transportation

Who we work with

We are looking to acquire profitable companies in Food Manufacturing and Engineering sectors with turnover of between £1m and £8m. Other manufacturing businesses outside of these sectors are also considered.

We are not business brokers. That said, we are connected with people who are looking to acquire businesses in many different sectors including:

Insurance Broking
Funeral Directors
Healthcare and Beauty
Technology and Telecoms
Cybersecurity

We are more than happy to refer your business on to trusted and credible buyers with a history of experience in your sector.

How the process works

Flowchart of buying a business process

Why choose us?

Long standing business owners all reach a point where they want to go off and sit on the beach, go on a long road trip or simply spend time with their grandchildren.

But the shackles to their company prevent them from doing this.

They are concerned about making sure their legacy grows, the livelihoods of their employees are secured as well as those of their customers and suppliers.

Sharp End Equity can buy businesses and can eliminate these concerns for you.

Sharp End Equity can bring you to that point where your business is desirable and more likely to sell to your favoured buyer.

About

My name is James Richmond and I may be the solution you’re looking for. 
My background is in manufacturing and logistics having worked in and delivered improvement projects in medium to large businesses across many industrial sectors including food, steel making, shipping and transportation.

I started out selling fish across the North of England and moved into consulting in the early 90s working with SME businesses in the North East.

In 1995 I started specialising in manufacturing operations, delivering improvement projects in medium to large scale factories across Europe. These projects were always targeted with specific financial benefits through delivery of shopfloor based improvements. These were achieved by working with people at all levels of the business in question.

With over 25 years of consulting experience, the industries I have worked with include steelmaking, airline catering, sandwich manufacture, food ingredients and car components to name a few.

Projects have included setting up third party logistics providers for raw materials and finished goods; materials and services purchasing; production planning; production operations, reporting and review; waste reduction; asset maintenance and sales and marketing operations.

I set up Sharp End Equity Partners to help business owners achieve their dreams of being free from their companies and to continue their legacy, retaining employees, premises and positive culture.

I started out selling fish across the North of England and moved into consulting in the early 90s working with SME businesses in the North East.

In 1995 I started specialising in manufacturing operations, delivering improvement projects in medium to large scale factories across Europe. These projects were always targeted with specific financial benefits through delivery of shopfloor based improvements. These were achieved by working with people at all levels of the business in question.

With over 25 years of consulting experience, the industries I have worked with include steelmaking, airline catering, sandwich manufacture, food ingredients and car components to name a few.

Projects have included setting up third party logistics providers for raw materials and finished goods; materials and services purchasing; production planning; production operations, reporting and review; waste reduction; asset maintenance and sales and marketing operations.

I set up Sharp End Equity Partners to help business owners achieve their dreams of being free from their companies and to continue their legacy, retaining employees, premises and positive culture.

Testimonials

We count James amongst the select few who can actually do our line of work – consistently, reliably, and diligently delivering measured performance improvement under demanding timelines and in difficult environments. I like James personally, and respect him professionally…

– Leading Operations Expert

I have worked with James on quite some challenging projects. James proved to be a seasoned professional with the right focus on delivering measurable results, while maintaining a good relationship with clients, employees and his co team members. James is a real team player not afraid to share his knowledge and help other members on his team. He is not only one of the best consultants I worked with, he is also a real pleasant person to work with.

– Senior Supply Chain Professional

I had the chance to work with James, he has the experience ‘the eye and the capacity of finding things hiding in places you could not suspect. He has a very British sense of humour and a great working capacity…

– Operations Director

FAQs

How do you prepare to sell your business?

Imagine you are a business owner that has developed a business over the course of several or many years. You decide the time has come to exit; you may want to be spending time with grandchildren, spending time travelling around the UK in your camper van, or something else.  But where do you start?

In the first instance, it is essential to talk to your accountant and your independent financial adviser. They are the specialist financial experts who will guide you through the tax implications to find the best path for you and your particular circumstances.  You need to do this early.

You should then very seriously consider whether you are selling a business or a job. If you have all your processes and procedures documented and staff trained and are running those processes efficiently and effectively, with little intervention from yourself, then you are selling a business. It could be that you have a great management team in place; this is even better, as there is potentially someone there to step up and run the company after your departure. 

However, if the business is totally dependent on you to make every decision, then you are potentially attempting to sell a job. This is extremely hard to achieve, especially if all the expertise is in your head.

The truth of your particular situation may lie somewhere between these two extremes. That said, in order to realise a transition to a new owner, you will most likely be asked to stay in the business for between three and twelve months and a clause to this effect will be put in the Purchase and Sale Agreement.  A portion of the payments may well be attached to delivering a successful transfer.  (That said, it may be possible that you actually want to stay in the business.)

Your aim, in preparing to sell your business needs to be targeted at readying your company to run without you. This will probably take time as you need to break out of the restricting mould you find yourself in. You should be prepared to ask for help in putting your business in order.

The next step is ensuring that you have all the documentation potential buyers will request. This documentation will include:

  • Ownership structure (including subsidiaries and holding company)
  • List of all directors and shareholders
  • Last three years filed or statutory accounts to include Profit and Loss  and Balance Sheet
  • Last financial year and year to date monthly management accounts (Profit and Loss  and Balance Sheet)
  • Current year monthly management accounts (Profit and Loss  and Balance Sheet)
  • Current year forecast and future years (if available)
  • Current balance sheet
  • List of current mortgages, charges and debentures
  • List of personal guarantees
  • Summary of any debt (with related security), leases, hire purchase including amount outstanding, debt provider, and period left to run.
  • List of current employees (can be anonymous) covering role, years of service, annual salary & benefits provided
  • List of top 20 customers (by annual sales) (can be anonymous)
  • List of top 20 products/services (by annual sales)

Once you have completed all these tasks, then you are on your way to being prepared for your potential buyer.

Then comes the question of price and valuation. A search of the internet can help to an extent.  You need to have in mind a realistic number which should be based on facts, namely the current profitability of the business and the current value of any assets held by the business, including property, if owned, and key pieces of machinery.

Also you need to consider what kind of sale you want: a share sale (whereby the business is sold as a going concern) or an asset sale (selling off the individual assets such as machinery, inventory etc.).  

Finally, how are you going to put your business on the market? Are you going to use a broker? Or your accountant? Or your existing network of contacts? Or maybe you’ve been approached in the past?  Whichever path you decide to follow, make sure you understand the full ramifications of what you are doing with your trusted advisers. 

In this article, we have covered “preparing to sell”.   There is a raft of other measures you can take, such as increasing your marketing effort to improve sales, working on your cost of sales and overhead efficiencies.  That is for another time. 

Over to you, and the very best of luck.

Contact

James Richmond, Sharp End Equity Partners