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Episode Summary
You have a building lease coming up. If you renew it, you’re locked in another five years, plus a round of capex that keeps you in for five more after that. You’re 48, getting restless, the industry is shifting under you, and your CPA does taxes while your banker watches the line. Nobody is sitting at the chart with you asking the question that actually matters: what’s the deadline that forces the deal? That’s where Tim Kieran sat. He’d built Western Graphics from his dad’s $3M printing shop into an $11M, 80-person operation with a six-time Best Workplace track record. The first market test came back honest: too small for a financial buyer, too customer-concentrated (40% in one account) to fetch a real EBITDA multiple, perfect tuck-in candidate for a strategic. So Tim went on offense. He wrote six requirements for the buyer (location, print-centric, service-oriented, bigger capacity, family-based, take the majority of employees) and got all six. 40 of 44 employees placed inside 18 months. Building lease timed to closing. Six-week transition. We dig into what “landing the plane” actually looks like when the deadline is real and the trade-offs between cash and people are on the table.
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## Top 10 Takeaways- The journey doesn’t end when you become successful. It ends when you leave the business successfully.
- A restless owner is a dangerous owner. Your team deserves someone who’s all in.
- Test the market before you negotiate. Find out if you’re a tuck-in or a standalone first.
- Customer concentration crushes your multiple. 40% in one account turns price into an earn-out.
- Define what “fair to employees” means before you take the meeting, not after the LOI.
- Write your requirements for the buyer in advance. Negotiate from your list, not their term sheet.
- Time your building lease expiration to the exit. The lease becomes the deadline that forces the deal.
- A hard deadline beats a hypothetical deadline. Without one, the process drifts for years.
- A local buyer protects employee careers. A distant buyer protects no one’s commute or culture.
- Plan your second act before you sell. Restless without a destination is just exit panic.
Sound Bites
“The journey doesn’t end for a business when you become successful. The journey ends when you leave the business successfully.” (@TBD) — Tim Kieran
“I’m restless now, and that means I’m a little bit dangerous because I’m not all in. I’ve got one foot out.” (@TBD) — Tim Kieran
“Luck is defined when opportunity meets preparedness.” (@TBD) — Tim Kieran
“I want 50% of this to be financial, so the earn-out money can work and I can go do my second act. But the other 50% of the equation is I want the employees taken care of.” (@TBD) — Tim Kieran
“If things aren’t going well in the business, we should all be waking up at 2:39 in the morning. Not just the owner, not just the executive team. Sharing the insomnia.” (@TBD) — Tim Kieran
About This Episode
Tim Kieran bought Western Graphics from his dad in 2001, grew it from $3M and 20 employees to $11M and 80 employees at its peak, and sold it 15 years later to a local strategic buyer in a deal he engineered around six non-negotiable requirements. Western was a six-time Best Workplace in America winner and ran an open-book, continuous-improvement culture (3,800 employee-led improvements in the final year before sale). Tim now runs Altus, where he coaches business owners and facilitates peer groups full-time, which he calls his “second act.” His story is a clinic in how to land the plane on a real deadline when you’re too small for a financial buyer and customer-concentrated enough to be capped on multiple.
Resources Mentioned
- Altus — Tim’s consulting and peer group business. — altusba.com
- Tim Kieran on LinkedIn — tim at altusba.com
- The Great Game of Business by Jack Stack — Referenced for open-book management
- Good to Great by Jim Collins — Referenced as part of Tim’s management influences
- The E-Myth by Michael Gerber — Referenced for the technician/manager/entrepreneur frame
- EOS / Traction by Gino Wickman — Referenced as the operating system Tim installed
- Rockefeller Habits by Verne Harnish — Referenced as part of Tim’s professionalization toolkit
- Patrick Lencioni — Referenced as part of Tim’s team and culture influences
- “Landing the Plane” analogy — From a Hawaii-based construction peer in Tim’s national peer group
Connections
Phase + Module:
- Module 9 — Operator Transition — The full arc Tim walks through (deciding, prepping, finding the buyer, exiting the seat)
Milestones:
- Milestone 5 — Market Value — Tim’s first market test that surfaced the tuck-in reality
- Milestone 6 — Transaction Value — The deal structure, earn-out, and asset sale mechanics
- Milestone 25 — Operator Transition Plan — Six-week handoff after closing
Concepts referenced:
- Value Gap — Customer concentration capped the multiple and pushed the deal into earn-out territory
- Three Lenses of Value — Tim effectively ran his business through all three (DCF, market test, transaction)
- Normalized EBITDA — The standard the strategic buyers tested him against before passing on a clean multiple