The buyer will know what your business is worth. You should know first.

Lattice is a Longview, Texas firm that helps owners get their companies ready to sell, and get paid full value when they do. For eleven deals, my job was to find reasons to pay less for companies like yours. Now I work for the other side of the table.

$3M–$30M revenue · Industrial and services · One to five years from a transition

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$20M

Built and sold

Acquisitions closed

$46M

Acquired revenue

CFO

Private equity-owned company

Most owners find out what their business is worth on the worst possible day.

A private equity group called. The number sounded big. You had no way to tell whether it was.

Your CPA is good. At taxes. He has never built you a forecast, and you have never asked him to.

You have spent ten years minimizing taxable income. That is about to work against you.

One customer is a quarter of your revenue and everyone in the building knows which one.

The business runs because you are in it. A buyer will price that.

You have been meaning to get things cleaned up for three years.

None of these are emergencies today. Every one of them is expensive at closing.

I have been the operator, the seller, and the buyer. The buyer's seat is the one that matters to you.

I built AutoBody Express to roughly $20 million in revenue and sold it to Caliber Collision. Then I stayed and ran acquisitions for them: eleven deals, about $46 million in acquired revenue. My job was to find the reasons to pay less, and I was good at it.

Since then I have been the CFO of an East Texas industrial services company owned by a private equity group — the same kind of professional buyer that may one day call you: rebuilding the general ledger and the reporting, running the close, and answering to their board every month.

So when I tell you a buyer will discount your customer concentration, or that your add-backs will not survive a quality of earnings review, I am not repeating something I read. I am telling you what I did.

Operator

AutoBody Express. Built to ~$20M revenue, sold to Caliber Collision.

Buyer

Caliber Collision. 11 acquisitions closed, ~$46M acquired revenue.

CFO

Industrial services company owned by a private equity group, East Texas. Board reporting, monthly.

CEPA. Two U.S. patents. BBA Finance, Abilene Christian University.

Three ways to work together.

Practical financial leadership for owners preparing to grow or transition.

Most owners start here

Exit Readiness Diagnostic

A three-week look at your business the way a buyer looks at it. You get a defensible valuation range, the specific items a buyer will discount, what each one is likely to cost you, and a prioritized twelve-month plan to fix them.

Typically $15,000, agreed in writing before I start. Three weeks from the day I receive your numbers. Half of it is credited against your first invoice if you engage a retainer within ninety days.

Fractional CFO

Monthly retainer. I run your financial function the way a buyer will one day audit it: a close that lands on time, a forecast you can steer with, a thirteen-week cash view, and a monthly package your bank and your board actually read. The outcome is not better bookkeeping. It is a business that is worth more and easier to sell.

Typically $7,500 a month, scoped in writing before I start.

Selling Your Business, or Buying One

Representation when it is time to sell, with a success fee at closing. Or origination and diligence support if you are the one buying. I would rather work with you for two years before the sale than meet you at the table.

Three steps. No deck.

A free thirty-minute call. I ask what you want the business to do for you, and when. You will not see a slide.

The diagnostic. Three weeks. You get the number and the list.

The work: a retainer, a project, or nothing at all. Plenty of owners take the list and fix it themselves.

Who this is for.

It's a fit if

you do $3 million to $30 million in revenue; you are in East Texas or close enough that I can drive to you; you are one to five years from a transition: a sale, a handoff to family, or simply stepping back; and you are in industrial or energy services, fabrication, construction, manufacturing, distribution, transportation, or healthcare services.

It's not a fit if

you are pre-revenue or under about $2 million; you want a broker to list the business this quarter; or you want someone to agree with a decision you have already made.

I sat on the buyer's side of the table eleven times. Here is what we looked for.

When I was the buyer, I kept a list of eleven problems that let me pay less: one customer too big, earnings I could not verify, a business that only ran because the owner was in it. The full list names all eleven, what each one cost the seller, and how long it takes to fix. The expensive ones take eighteen to thirty-six months, which is why I would rather meet you now than the week a buyer's offer shows up.

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I live in Longview. I have built a company, sold it, bought eleven more for the buyer, and since have served as CFO answering to the private equity investors who own the company I help run.

I started Lattice because the owners I meet around here have built genuinely valuable companies and are almost always surprised, usually unpleasantly, when they find out what that is worth to somebody else. That gap is fixable. It is just not fixable in the ninety days before a closing.

Jonathan Pyle

Questions owners actually ask

I already have a CPA.

Good. Keep him. Your CPA looks backward and minimizes tax. A buyer looks forward and pays for provable earnings. Those two jobs fight each other, and ten years of winning the first one is one of the most common reasons a good business appraises low.

I am not selling for five years.

Then this is the right time to call. The problems that cost the most money take the longest to fix. Customer concentration and undocumented add-backs run eighteen to thirty-six months. The ones you can fix in ninety days are the cheap ones.

Are you a broker?

Mostly no. A broker's only paycheck is the closing, which is a fine incentive on closing day and a poor one two years out. My month-to-month work is paid by retainer or by the project. When it is time to sell and you want me at the table, I will represent you, and that fee does include a success fee at closing.

What does it cost?

The first call costs nothing. The diagnostic is typically $15,000, agreed in writing before I start. If you engage a retainer within ninety days of the readout, $7,500 of it comes off your first invoice. Retainers run about $7,500 a month, scoped in writing.

Will you sign an NDA?

Yes, before the first call if you would rather.

Do you work outside East Texas?

Sometimes, and I will tell you honestly whether being three hours away will cost you anything. Most of what I do well, I do best in person.