Tom Macpherson Email & Phone Number

Charlotte, Nc, Us

Metro Charlotte, Nc

As a professional Business Broker / M&A Advisor, I usually works with no more than two or three clients at any one time. Most of my engagements involve assisting owners of privately held companies [valued between $1M and $25M] sell their businesses - confidentially. When I find a business owner interested in selling his profitable business for market price, I have no problem finding buyers for my client. There are many people who want to own their own business, and Summit sells about 90% of the businesses they represent. [See "How to Value Your Business" below]A few of my engagements each year also involve assisting organizations find and acquire strategic acquisitions. Finding a business to acquire is very time-consuming, can be quite complex to find the right one, and follows a certain protocol to increase the likelihood of success. As a professional Business Broker / M& A Advisor focusing in these two areas, I save my clients considerable time and money - and tremendously increase the probability of their desired outcome.See my blog where I discuss such topics as: How to Sell Your Business, How to Value your Business, Increasing the Value of Your Business, M&A Terms, Business Transition Services, Exit Planning, and the Sellability of Your Business at http://summitacquisitions.com/blog/. Specialties: Business Acquisition, Business Brokerage, Business Valuation, Exit Planning, Deal Structure, Financial Analysis, Increase Business Value, Mergers & Acquisitions, Sellability of the Business, and Selling a Business. See "Sequence of Steps When Selling a Business" below.

Atlanta, Ga

After spending eight (8) years and public and private accounting, I wanted to own my own business – where I could make and keep the beans, not just count them. With the assistance and guidance of two KPMG partners, I purchased a modest size printing company 1980. With annual revenue of $700K and 8 employees, I worked just like my business-owner clients today – hiring and firing my own employees (without an H/R department), purchasing and leasing equipment (without a treasurer to crunch the numbers), beating the bushes and making cold calls to grow the business (without any sales or marketing VP’s), and managing the staff (without a degree in psychology). We eventually became the 10th largest single-location quick print company in America, with 33 employees and annual revenue of almost $4 million. However, while the Internet relentlessly drove down the prices of our printing services, the terrible unforeseen events of the fall of 2001 immediately shrunk the business to half its former size. While more fortunate than many similar size companies, I would someone to purchase my business – and I began a new career in 2002.While in the printing industry, I served for a number of years as a member of Board of Directors of the Printing Industry Association of Georgia - where I met a number of hard-working, smart, dedicated people who provided great perspective to me. Lesson: Get involved in your industry associations.

Dayton, Ohio Area

Supervised accounting department of public utility. There was no point in saving the company any expenses, as the Public Utility Commission would only lower the rates charged to our customers. Company officers were afraid to talk about nuclear energy, because the public was afraid after 3 Mile Island accident and the 1979 movie - The China Syndrome. I got out of that industry as quickly as I could.

Atlanta

I worked primarily on the audits of companies with revenues between $5M and $50M. My most interesting assignment was to perform an acquisition audit [foreshadowing my current career] of a mulch manufacturing plant being purchased by Gillette. The story of how the sellers built their business to the size that would attract a public company is a classic story of two entrepreneurs-brothers (John & Mark) who would never give up.The business started as a worm farm, where they grew and sold worms, crawling in decomposing organic matter, to fishermen in the area. From this early business, they tapped into a growing local market for mulch – sold in local nurseries. They obtained their raw material from local pine tree logging companies, who wanted to dispose of the unusable bark. With ever growing piles of this free raw material, the John spent much time moving the piles with bulldozers to prevent the decomposing pile from catching on file. However, the normal oxidation process would not be denied, and John spent many hours putting out fires on their piles of mulch. Meanwhile, one of the brothers (Mark) started calling on major retailers to sell his popular product – which was packaged using a proprietary system developed by John. Despite staying in cheap hotels while visiting the buyers, eating from vending machines, and having very little success with the unpolished sales pitch of a Georgia farm boy, Mark would not give up. Eventually he was given the opportunity to stock his product in a few Wal-Marts, and the business took off like a rocket.