Why You Should Sell Your Company Now with Andy Cagnetta
“The gift of empathy and also given the gift of education. I think that was an incredible gift, and I met some wonderful people that I actually went into business with later that helped finance Transworld and take it to the next level.”
Andy Cagnetta is a recognized leader in the business brokerage industry and the South Florida business community. Experienced in selling hundreds of businesses throughout South Florida as an agent and owner for Transworld. Specialize in mergers and acquisitions, especially technology-related, manufacturing and distribution businesses. A Certified Business Intermediary through the IBBA (CBI)
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Brett:
I’m excited about our next guest, let’s face it in today’s economy, there are more people looking to buy and sell businesses than ever before. When a company owner needs to sell their business, they can’t just stick a sign for sale sign in the window, they need the assistance of a business broker to locate and vet potential buyers. On the other side, buyers rely on the broker to help facilitate the process of evaluating potential businesses in franchise franchises for sale, and our next guest is the CEO and I believe me perhaps even the founder of Trans World business advisors, and he is here to offer so much wisdom for us and talk about why you should sell your company now. Please welcome show with me, Andy Cagnetta. Andy, how are you doing?
Andy:
Brett, how are you?
Brett:
I’m better than I deserve. excited to have you on the show. For our listeners getting to know for the first time, would you give us a little bit more about your story and your current focus?
Andy:
Sure, actually, I am not the founder, which is great because I did what a lot of people are doing out there in the world. I came down to Florida looking to buy a business, met with a bunch of Business Brokers who felt like it was in a used car salesroom ran into Transworld one day super nice people. They invited me to join the company, and then I bought it. I bought it two years into my stint as a salesperson, I grew the company from one office to 10 offices, which we still own and operate in Florida, and then to further expand across the world, we decided to franchise with a partnership with United franchise group, and now we have 200 offices, 700 people selling lots of businesses. that’s it in a nutshell.
Brett:
Thank you so much for clarifying that, because there’s a lot going on there, and really cool. You bought basically bought a franchise and you’ve expanded it on multiple multiple offices now. before we dive into why you should sell your company now, why we think it’s the best business environment, perhaps in the history of selling businesses. I want to take one other step back, I want to listeners and myself to get to know you a little bit better. I want you to go back maybe to your high school college days, I believe I’ll be given certain gifts in this life, and these gifts have been given to us to be a blessing and help to others. Some people call these strengths some people call them superpowers. I think their God-given gifts and they’ve been given to us and to help and bless others. What are those one or two gifts that you believe you were given? And how does that help you help people today?
Andy:
I think I was given the gift of empathy by my grandfather. He was a wonderful guy. He was a union foreman for a bookbinding shop. I think I was given that gift. I was also given the gift of education, Lehigh University that my parents paid for. I think that was an incredible gift, and I met some wonderful people there that I actually went into business with later that helped finance Transworld and take it to the next level. I’ve been given many gifts along the way.
Brett:
I get empathy, empathy, the gift of education, the gift of other people helping you to excel in your career along the way. Very cool. Now let’s dive right into the topic at hand. What’s the number one reason why a listener who has a company, has a business? Why should they sell or consider selling right now?
Andy:
There are a few reasons I guess the main reason is demand right, there’s more buyer demand for businesses than ever before, and that could be pointed to a few reasons. One of them is the availability of money and how cheap it is. That is an incredible opportunity right now, and the other thing is that there’s just not a lot of inventory out there in the world to sell, and I think that’s changing. By the way. I do think baby boomers are coming to the market again. But a lot of people decided to hold on through this pandemic, and I think it created kind of a perfect storm to sell your business.
Brett:
More demand than ever buyers wanting to buy interest rates being lower than ever so money is cheap to borrow to be able to buy, and then there’s inventory kind of got, I guess stopped or things got delay during the pandemic. People probably don’t want to like sell their other their baby, they’ve been working for 10, 20, 30 years, and in a down year and so, all this, all the pivot all improve it or just hold on to that I don’t want to sell it at a discount. Is that a fair summary?
Andy:
That’s great. I agree with that, and there’s tons of private equity money out there too. The markets are crazy people are making money, and so there are available funds to make investments and companies are making more profits than ever. The strategic buyers, the M&A buyers, the private equity, the family offices, all this wealth is looking for a home, and when money interest rates are so low, you have two choices, basically, you got to dump it in to try to build a company or in private equity, or you got to, take your chances in the stock market, which people might feel is kind of overinflated at this point.
Brett:
That makes sense. What’s the number-two reason why you might consider selling your company right now?
Andy:
Because the baby boomers, so the numbers are just they’re not, can’t be denied that $12 trillion worth of private equity has to change hands, and a lot of those companies out there that need to sell the baby boomers are well into their 50s, at a minimum, at a maximum, they’re in their 70s, and those baby boomers are still holding on to their companies. Yes, people are more healthy than they used to be. But a lot of people are looking at this pandemic, saying, hey, it’s time for me to sell when that amount of businesses comes to the market. I think for the first time in 25 years, or maybe the second or third time in 25 years, we’re going to see it flipped from being a seller’s market to a buyer’s market because there’s just going to be too much business on the market. You want to beat that you don’t want to come in at that time.
Brett:
You want to sell and it’s a seller’s market, and when there’s low inventory, and you want to be early versus waiting when everyone’s trying to sell it’s pretty common sense economics. Is that a fair summary?
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