Industry snapshot: fatcow.com

The company we use to host our website is a real success story. The company, named FatCow (yes that is the company’s name), was started by Jackie Fewell in Albuquerque, NM, Mary’s home town. They have grown by more than 25% per year over the last few years with healthy profits. They had been approached a number of times in the last couple years to sell their business. Fewell reports that last spring, when she started to consider the possibility of selling, she made one of her best decisions ever; she prepared a book about her company that told the story of how and why they had built it. She controlled the message and controlled the process. In the end, Fewell had three bidders for the company and sold it to Endurance, a company based in Burlington, MA. Read more about this story in the New Mexico Business Weekly.

Fewell thought proactively about value. Investment bankers are great at maximizing value at the moment of a transaction. But at deal time, it is too late to make any significant value enhancements. The real money is in the work that company management does in the years leading up to a transaction—focusing on what will build the maximum value for the company.

Taking this perspective will ensure the long term success of your company and create realizable value for your shareholders. To learn more about this idea, read our recently published article in M&A Today (announced below). 2005