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Deal results

Founders who sold better

What each business looked like going in, the story it went to market with, and how the deal was shaped. Read the deals, then judge us.

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The odds

Most exits are not sales

When an owner leaves a small business, the business usually leaves with them. Nine in ten of those exits end with the doors closing. Only one in twenty ends in a sale. That is the field the deals below sit in, and it is why a sale at a defensible multiple is worth reading in detail.

  • Most owner exits end with the business shut down
  • A sale is the exception, not the default
  • The businesses that sell are the ones a buyer can underwrite
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How small-business exits end
0%0%0%
Shut down
Sold
Transferred
McKinsey Institute for Economic Mobility, 2026

Who advised

A young firm, an experienced team

FNDRS is a young firm. The people who run its sales are not new to the work: members of its M&A team have advised on sales across the United States, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East, much of that work at prior firms. Every deal below is credited to the members of the M&A team who advised on it, and none of it is presented as a sale FNDRS made on its own.

  • Every deal is credited to the members of the M&A team who advised on it, including work at prior firms
  • Work done at a prior firm is counted as experience, and said to be
  • No company, buyer, or advisory firm is named
Meet the deal team

The deals

What the deals looked like

Each went to market with a story built for it, in a process that put more than one buyer at the table. Filter them by how the deal was shaped, or open one to read it whole.

Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

  • Medical device manufacturing

    A precision medtech manufacturer in New York

    Founder-owned and FDA-registered, with about $11.5 million of EBITDA

    100%cash at close: a full founder exit, with no earn-out and no financing condition

    • Strategic buyer
    • 100% buyout
    • Medtech
    • New York

    Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

    Read the deal

  • Consumer products

    A premium personal-care brand in California

    Founder-built and omnichannel, with about $8 million of EBITDA

    20%equity rolled into the acquiring platform, with cash at close for the balance

    • PE-backed strategic
    • Platform add-on
    • Consumer products
    • California

    Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

    Read the deal

  • Roofing

    A roofing company in Texas

    A technology-enabled operator with about $6 million of EBITDA

    Sold at9.5xEBITDA

    • Private equity
    • Platform formation
    • Residential roofing
    • Texas

    Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

    Read the deal

  • Farm equipment distribution

    An equipment distributor in Minnesota

    Four locations, an authorized OEM dealer, about $26 million of EBITDA

    30%equity rolled by the two continuing shareholders; the other two exited in full at close

    • Private equity
    • Platform formation
    • Farm equipment
    • Minnesota

    Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

    Read the deal

  • Water infrastructure technology

    A water technology company, sold across borders

    A founder-led European company, sold to a platform in the Gulf

    $700Mapproximate transaction value, coordinated across three jurisdictions

    • Sovereign-wealth-backed buyer
    • Cross-border
    • Water infrastructure
    • Europe to the Gulf

    Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

    Read the deal

  • Specialty food ingredients

    A family food-ingredients company, sold across borders

    Family-owned in Latin America, with about $18 million of EBITDA

    100%family exit at close, after the ownership was prepared for sale

    • Strategic buyer
    • Family succession
    • Food ingredients
    • Latin America to the US

    Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

    Read the deal

  • Roofing

    A roofing company in Missouri

    80 percent residential, 20 percent commercial

    Sold at7.2xEBITDA

    • Private equity platform
    • Add-on
    • Roofing
    • Missouri

    Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

    Read the deal

  • Roofing

    A roofing company in Minnesota

    About $4.0M in EBITDA, after storm years of $5.5M to $6.5M

    Sold at6.5xEBITDA

    • Private equity
    • Equity rolled
    • Roofing
    • Minnesota

    Advised by members of the FNDRS M&A team, including at prior firms

    Read the deal

The four levers behind every one

  1. Answer every question firstWeeks of quantitative and qualitative analysis before anything goes to market, so the materials answer every question a buyer or investor will ask. Leverage at the letter of intent starts here: a factual, compelling story that leaves a buyer no risk to price.
  2. Tell the right storyOperational maturity, technology that sets the business apart, and the quality of its revenue, put in the terms a buyer underwrites.
  3. Run a competitive processA disciplined process with several qualified buyers at the table at once, so the tension between them sets the price.
  4. Structure to close the gapWhere buyer and seller see different numbers, the structure bridges them, so the total value to the shareholders is the number that counts, not the headline.

In their own words

Find a founder like you

Pick a state or a sector and hear from a founder who works in it. Short films, in their own words.

One founder, twelve months

Value built before a sale: 70 percent growth in a year

Joe SeeheyCEO, Cured Nutrition · Colorado

Where it started
A Discovery Day showed Joe Seehey where the gaps in Cured Nutrition were, and a plan to close each one.
What was worked on
Three things a buyer looks at first: recurring revenue, the business running without the founder, and clean financials.
Twelve months later
The company grew 70 percent and EBITDA rose 30 percent, with FNDRS alongside. The company has not been sold; this is the work that comes before a sale.

Element by element

Hear the elements explained

FNDRS Faculty explain the FNDRS Elements one at a time: what it is, what it means to a buyer, and where an owner starts. Choose a tile to watch it here: 18 of the 36 have a session of their own so far, and the rest play their part of their family's film.

Troy HoffmanTime

Visit the Elements

What moved

The elements buyers paid for

The deals above and the founder beside them came down to a short list of elements: documented operations, revenue that recurs, a business that runs without its owner, and books a buyer can trust. These are the ones that recur.

Explore the elements

Questions

What a careful founder asks of a results page

Members of the FNDRS M&A team advised on each of them, including at prior firms, and every deal carries that credit. No company, buyer, or advisory firm is named. FNDRS is a young firm, so we say advised on, because that is what the record shows.

Where a deal shows a multiple, it is the price at close as a multiple of the business's EBITDA, drawn against the band the sector usually trades in, as the deal team gives it: for roofing, 4.5x to 6.0x. Where a deal shows one headline figure instead, such as the share of equity rolled into the buyer's company, it is the figure reported for that deal.

Because the owners have not agreed to be named. The numbers can be shown without them; the names stay with the founders.

What a founder keeps depends on the structure, the debt, the fees, and their own tax position, which their CPA advises on, and none of these founders has agreed to share it. In a first conversation we can talk through what drives that number in a sale like yours.

A sale usually takes seven to twelve months from signing to the wire, and it starts with preparation before anything goes to market. Every time given here is an estimate drawn from past engagements, not a commitment: each sale runs on its own calendar.

A confidential conversation about your objectives, your timing, and your options. No pitch and no obligation. If the honest answer is not yet, we will tell you, and tell you what to work on.

Bring us your numbers

A confidential conversation with a dealmaker on what your business is worth today, what it could be worth, and what the gap would take. No pitch at the end of it.

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