That's, you know, I was brought in to go search and find metal finishing and fabrication companies that could be joined together in a way that was synergistic. And so throughout the late 1990s, my job was to go meet with business owners and find them and do everything you do that you do in a search. And as, as I did that in these meetings, I kept thinking, well, you know, what I want in my life…
Acquiring Minds
Exiting for Millions vs. Long-Term Hold
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As I met with these business owners I obviously got to see their operations and what they did and how they thought. I started to get an inkling that I wanted to be the owner, but it wasn't something that I, you know, acted upon for. For a few years, but definitely developed the thought there.
And then, you know, a couple of roadblocks came up and I decided it was time to do my own search. And through, you know, the 10 years after business school, I had put together, you know, a skill set that. That was basically, you know, how to do a search, how to run a little business, how to, you know, the ins and outs of LLC and structures and lawyers and accountants and how to get a deal done.
And. And I knew what it was like to operate a little business as well. So, like, for me, the whole process was organic. It wasn't like a subject I chose in business school or something like that.
You know, it was just fortuitous because certain things that led me to this path just happened. It wasn't part of a plan. And also. But. But I had the. I had the skill set to go do it.
And so finally I woke up and said, you know, I can do this or I think I can do this. I had, at that time, a young family. I had no sponsor, I had no capital except my own savings.
So it was a little bit daunting, but I did have the experience.
And, Don, so you really put this picture together of searching for buying a business, then becoming its owner, kind of based on your own, what you'd witnessed so far in your career, which is to say ETA as we know it today, search wasn't a thing, so nobody was talking about it. You had been in a private equity shop. So private equity, this is a version of private equity.
So the idea of buying business, private businesses was not new, and you had been working in it, but kind of putting it all together, that piece, plus the piece of owning and running a manufacturing, in your case, business, and just doing it, the whole thing as operator and as buyer, and that you would just set out on your own to do this. This was all kind of your own entrepreneurial flight of…
Yes, but it was. It was organic in that, you know, one thing did lead to another. Yeah. I didn't graduate from business school with a vision that. That got me there. I was lucky to have a set of experiences that did get me there.
Yeah.
If that makes sense.
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