Businesses for sale - buy - sell - Acquireo blog

Where Do You Want to Go Today? Part 1: I Don’t Know

Acquireo — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 18:28:00 +0000

I joined a Chinese couple, who recently began a retail clothing business, on a buying trip to Los Angeles, where I was to serve as English-language navigator. (I thought it would be fun since I don’t know LA at all and I could take a break from my work.) We hopped in the car in the darkness of Friday’s pre-dawn hours to begin our 550-mile voyage south. After one hour, we were east of where we started and lost. (I get to confess innocence since I don’t drive and therefore am not expected to know the highway systems.) They didn’t bring a map or even plan how to get there. Eventually finding LA, we discovered a cheap parking lot, left the car, and began walking. Then I discovered the true reason why I had been asked to accompany them: they had no idea where to find clothing wholesalers. Walking into a couple of very small clothing stores, they had me ask the merchants if they wholesaled. Most didn’t; those few that did wholesale didn’t have the merchandise the couple needed to buy. After two hours of this executing this successful and obviously well-planned strategy, I was given a lead by a young employee: there might be wholesale clothing warehouses five blocks away. I led the couple onward, saw banners hanging from street lamps reading "Fashion District" and hit pay dirt: blocks of stores offering clothing at wholesale and retail prices. You already know where I’m going with this. And I know you don’t make these kind of planning errors. In planning to buy your business, hire an expert to guide you who has traveled the road before and can lead you fashionably and directly to the pay dirt district. You’ll find these experts in Acquireo’s business broker directory and in the business directory. If you are an expert yourself, make sure you get your company listed with our Broker Services Division, Brokerlogics. The odyssey continues with Part 2: Do You Know The Way to San Jose?

Part 2: Do You Know the Way to San Jose?

Acquireo — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 18:34:00 +0000

Read "Part 1: I Don't Know" here Everyone's mother warned about not taking candy from strangers, but I don't remember any of those mothers talking about rejecting well-meaning but totally ignorant advice. The clothes-buying couple mentioned to a shop clerk the intolerable six-hour duration of the Highway 101 voyage down to LA. The clerk, giddy from the fresh sale, commiserated and let them know that if they took Highway 5 back, it would only take three hours. Thank goodness for friendly shop clerks: they give you an extra discount off your purchase and save you three hours off your trip home. All we needed to do was to get on Highway 10 East and connect to Highway 5 North to get home. Using my new computer which processes 1 quadrillion instructions a second, I determined 550 miles in three hours might be an exaggeration for their 1996 Toyota Corolla. But the husband is a very able auto mechanic, so he might have squeezed a Ferrari engine under the hood. Secret knowledge in hand, they headed back to the parking lot, got the car, and met me in the Fashion District where I stood guard over their newly acquired inventory. Exhausted, we found a motel and stayed over, ready to return home tomorrow. At 8am, we found Highway 10 East easily enough and drove out. And drove. And drove. You know, 120 miles in the wrong direction goes really fast at 80 miles an hour. And the scorched, stark scenery of Palm Desert contrasts so wonderfully with Los Angeles. We pulled over at a rest stop, I examined the map on the bulletin board, and offered my input. Fast forward to 8pm: we enter our home town, rejoicing with gladness that we took the fast route. And with delight that we took well-meaning but ignorant advice from strangers. You know better: hire a business broker for buying or selling your business

Business for sale: Must be able to type in your sleep

Acquireo — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 00:35:00 +0000

Back in my college days at the University of California at Berzerkeley, my roommate started a wee little business: typing papers for the hunt-and-peck fraternity crowd. He bootstrapped the entire operation: borrowing my technologically advanced electric typewriter with built-in correction ribbon and “borrowing” clean sheets of paper by the ream from the campus office of his part-time job. Business was just picking up to nearly $5 a day (5 typed pages) as word-of-mouth advertising spread when he decided to take a full course load the next semester, which meant no time for typing. He asked if I wanted to take over and, since I had a light course load and could type 80 words a minute in my sleep, I decided to give it at try. I had completed my first acquisition, a service business. Some of his customers continued to come by and learned that the business was “now under new management.” The new management decided to make customer satisfaction a priority and offered extended hours which meant that after a night of heavy partying, I would get 7am knocks at my door for papers that needed to be in the professor’s box by 10am. Word of this increased service quality spread throughout the Greek fraternity system like a marathoner. I was soon running a heavy backlog of orders even as I dramatically increased my pricing structure to ward off this vicious onslaught of people wanting to give me money, while even more new and repeat customers arrived with chicken-scratch handwritten pages and imported beer six-packs humbly seeking to get bumped up the production list. I landed some large accounts (series of multiple drafts of seniors’ final papers of 50 pages each) that paid my room rent for several semesters. The business was cutting into my sleep time, but fortunately for me, I could type 80 words a minute in my sleep. Not knowing anybody who wanted to take over the business, not yet having heirs who could continue this thriving business, and not knowing any business brokers who could find a buyer for me, I decided to essentially destroy the value of the business (it’s growing account base) by closing up shop. Don’t trash the value you build in your business. Either list your business for sale yourself or hire a business broker to sell your business

Are you looking for a job or a business?

Acquireo — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 06:04:00 +0000

Way back in the last millennium – I think it was 1988 – a fellow tenant named Sam owned a Subway® sandwich shop on the ground floor of the two-story walkup office building I was in. He did great business, since everyone knew the Subway® brand of sandwich franchise, and the parking lot was overflowing on weekends. I got to know him since he sublet office space at night from me to do his accounting, as he had no room in the back of his shop for a desk. I don’t know what kind of margins a retail sandwich business makes – I’m sure they’re excellent plus you get a delicious free lunch – but I do know that Sam was there early opening the store, taking orders, making sandwiches, closing the register, and cleaning up at night. He either kept extremely tight reins on his expenses or wasn’t ready to let go personally of some duties of the business. As you search for businesses for sale on Acquireo, keep in mind the longer-term picture of being able to delegate some of the business duties to others, either to employees or to third-party suppliers and service providers. That can free up your time, which can lead to expanded locations for your business or even adding an entirely new business. And it will keep you from burning out on an important part of your life. Many of you may be like Sam: formerly of the corporate world, seeking independence in a new world. And like Sam, many of you already have excellent managerial skills; just remember to put them to use in the businesses you buy.

How to start your own...don't!

Acquireo — Wed, 07 Jun 2006 01:07:00 +0000

I was hungrily grazing in the bookstore seeking food for thought and found myself in an alcove filled with business start-up books and guides. Pulling one about the specialty travel industry off the shelf, the back cover promised to feed me: "Turn your hunger for adventure into an exhilarating – and lucrative – business." Checking the menu (table of contents), I found there was a lot to digest and more of a meal than I was prepared to stomach in one sitting: briefing the reader on what the industry is, describing essential office equipment, determining your business structure, acquiring licenses and organization memberships, finding a profitable niche and conducting marketing, running your finances, and more. It sounds a lot like taking the stairs to the 25th floor when you can take the elevator. If you buy an established business on Acquireo, you don't have to go through a lot of what these start-up guides discuss, regardless of the industry or the quality of advice. You don't have to start your own anything. It's wonderfully simple to swallow and much easier to digest.

I can't do that: the statistics won't let me

Acquireo — Wed, 31 May 2006 23:32:00 +0000

I follow real estate and saw the following headline: "Rents take a leap as retail vacancy rate plummets to 3.02%" I can imagine retail brokers across that particular region checking in with each other before retail space is leased or offered for lease, in order to maintain that magical 3.02% vacancy rate. Let's listen in on a phone call at that well-known business brokerage that also handles retail leasing now:

Broker: Good morning, ABC-XYZ Realty. How may I help you? Owner: I own that shopping center down the street. A tenant just moved out and I want you to find me a new tenant. Broker: What's the square footage of the space? Owner: 1234 square feet. Broker: Let's see. I know DEF-TUV Realty just listed 2345 square feet of retail space. And yesterday, GHI-QRS Realty found someone for that 4567 square feet across town. If we bring this space officially onto the market, the vacancy rate is going to go to . . . (background sound of calculator keys) . . . 3.13%. I'm sorry, we at ABC-XYZ Realty have a professional commitment to maintain the high standards of the industry, including not disturbing officially released statistics. We cannot put your retail space on the market, unless it maintains the 3.02% vacancy rate. Owner: I'm disappointed that I can't offer my space for lease, but I understand. We are dealing with the truth here.

Of course, the above dialog may actually not have taken place. Maybe certain forms of it did. But people's actions follow upon their beliefs. Am I being absurd? Yes, but only to make a point. Statistics, however they are compiled and however accurate they may be, provide a snapshot of a situation which can change over time. We are swimming in and swamped with statistics, and sometimes need a gentle reminder to use them as tool, while protecting ourselves by not always let them control our thinking and determine our decisions. They certainly are not interest rates for fixed rate bank loans, which are also quoted in percentage terms but do reflect accurately a part of the lending terms of the loan. As you look for businesses for sale on Acquireo in your quest to buy a business, remember that you have greater control of the success of the economy of your business than anyone else. The statistics told me so.

Site Update: BrokerLogics

Acquireo — Tue, 23 May 2006 00:51:00 +0000

I'm delighted that we recently went live with BrokerLogics, our broker services division of Acquireo. It's especially tailored to the needs of business brokers who list their client's businesses for sale on Acquireo. Brokers have 2 types of accounts to choose from: High Gear broker services and Low Gear broker services. High Gear accounts get unlimited premier listings and a free preferred business broker directory listing. This gives both their listings and their firm greater exposure throughout Acquireo. Low Gear accounts, designed for business brokers who might not be as active in listing businesses, get unlimited standard listings a month and a free professional business broker directory listing. Within either account, business brokers can easily add new listings and modify existing ones. I think we're doing a pretty good job in offering terrific value for business brokers. Acquireo's an advanced site using cutting-edge technology, beautiful and clean in design, and easy to figure out. The listing periods are longer than most others. And we're gonna keep on working hard every day to increase that value. Are you a business broker? Check out BrokerLogics

With room for cream, please

Acquireo — Thu, 11 May 2006 16:10:00 +0000

Are you one of the zillions of people whose work routine is to leave the house, walk down to the corner, buy a $3 cup of espresso-based coffee, find a table and power up your laptop, and log onto a wireless internet? You mean that was you at the table next to me? Nice shoes. In the old days, you got your cup of coffee at the diner, along with a slice of homemade apple pie, served by a friendly, mothering, gum-chomping waitress named Madge, clad in her pale pink and white uniform. You remember: she always licked her pencil tip before scribbling your order. Today, you walk into a café - we'll arbitrarily call it AstralMoney - and order your customized coffee and its size in Italian. The workforce is increasingly mobile - and that presents some wonderful, interesting opportunities for you. As you search for businesses to buy on Acquireo, keep in mind that there so many profitable underlying long-term trends as the world continues to find curiouser and curiouser ways to define itself and the individuals within it seek to find their freedom of self-expression. AstralMoney customers telecommute to the corner café Monday through Friday and order a no-foam, no-fat, triple soy, back-flip latte - instead of punching a clock. The café is their work place, and they show up in great numbers to the great benefit of AstralMoney Corporation cafes across the land. The conversion to electronic versions of everything, from banking and books to grocery shopping. The increasing shift in responsibility solely to the individual for his or own welfare and decision making, such as retirement investment management. The increasing mass customization of jeans and music and cell phone ringtones and web portal experiences as technology opens new distribution channels while bringing costs down, down, down. We're talking big-picture stuff here, folks. You can bring those big-picture ideas into any business for sale on Acquireo. Where did you get big-picture ideas? How about from books by futurists? My favorite futurist is Alvin Toffler. In short, don't see things as they are; see them as they can be. In 1960, a microwave oven in the home would have blown people's minds. Today, its necessity in the kitchen for quick reheating is unquestionable. Is it too far to imagine a subscription-based customized coffee delivered daily to your kitchen teleporter?

Possible BUSINESS FOR SALE ad on Acquireo:

Acquireo — Thu, 11 May 2006 15:56:00 +0000

"Have your own hare-raising experience. Rabbit farm for sale. Reasonable price. Includes rapidly growing inventory. Call 555-1234 after school hours until bedtime and ask for Jennie or Tommy." Why are Jennie and Tommy selling?

They have suffered financial reverses, already pawned their Xbox® game equipment, but still are desperate for cash.
Jennie and Tommy are overwhelmed by success and lack the experience to manage their business at its larger level.
Executives (Mom and Dad) of their corporate parent held a board meeting and decided not to bring a new CEO experienced in managing larger operations.
The company no longer fits into long-term strategic goals.
The entire world has turned to vegetarian food and cruelty-free clothing, evaporating their markets for rabbit meat and pelts.

Acquireo lists thousands of businesses for sale, and each seller has his or her own reason for selling. Sometimes they're based on financial reasons, sometimes on management ability, sometimes on personal reasons. Here are some general reasons:

Owner's plans change. Perhaps it was started as a side business and grew more successfully than the founders originally anticipated. The owners had to answer the question: do I want to continue in this?
Not interested in personally taking the business to the next level, but want to find someone who will do so.

If you're challenged in imagining reasons why an owner would sell their business, think instead about why people sell their homes: financial (taking a profit); lifestyle changes (need more space, want maintenance-free condo); relocation (for job/employment/career: as corporate employee or moving closer to activity centers, such as Hollywood for film); more appropriate neighborhoods or schools for children. Here's a quick real-life example. I had a consulting business with a very lumpy income: a couple of months of inflow followed by a couple of months of quietude. So I started a wholesale/retail operation in a totally different industry to even out the ups and downs, and succeeded. But the new business took too much time away from my core consulting business (ordering inventory, managing employees, manning the retail store myself when employees called in "sick"). Like Jennie and Tommy, the business succeeded but no longer fit into long-term strategic goals. If the seller hasn't stated the reason, you don't always know why a seller is selling. Instead of assuming the reason, help yourself by finding out. Even better: if you're represented by a business broker (and I highly recommend that you are), you have an experienced agent working on your behalf to find out whatever he or she can without revealing information about you. Then you can have your own hare-raising experience!

Drips that leads to showers of money

Acquireo — Fri, 05 May 2006 06:37:00 +0000

This morning, after finishing my shower, I turned the water off and switched off the diverter. (Okay: so we're gonna talk about plumbing businesses, right?) Then, I heard something I hadn't heard for quite a while: water draining from the shower spout down onto the tub spout, creating a ringing bell sound. I hear that sound every day, but I don't "hear" it, having tuned it out a long time ago. Its human behavior to quickly tune out environmental noise that it first finds to be distracting. Like the fellow whose house is located at the end of a major airport runway but sleeps soundly each night to the soothing, violent roars of 747s. This also goes for sellers of businesses. This tremendous benefit for you is this: as a buyer, you come into any particular business with a fresh perspective. You'll be able to see and hear drips that the sellers don't pay attention to anymore, perhaps as loud as 747s. Some drips may be creating sounds that drive buyers away, but are easy to fix, like cashiers with extremely bad breath. Who knows how much more revenue you can create each year just by brushing, flossing, gargling, and crunching on a couple of breath mints? Or easy to fix, like the mixed message of a clean-appearing restaurant with restaurant supplies (napkins and utensils) stacked up in the hallway to the restroom. How do you practice seeing the drips? Be a more observant customer in the businesses you now go to or interact with. Take note of what you see and hear. The notes you take will help you hear the ringing-bell drips that can change into showers of money.

When 20 cents = $468.00, or Better than being an early investor in Google

Acquireo — Fri, 05 May 2006 06:31:00 +0000

I love going into Chinatown to my favorite Chinese bakery to order their Chinese pork buns (known in Cantonese as char siu bao). Priced at 80 cents each, the counter help long ago upsold me by letting me know I can get 4 buns for $3. I have been ordering 4 for $3 ever since, 3 times a week. I was a bit surprised last Sunday when I dropped in, ordered 4 from the manager, and was charged $3.20, 20 cents more than usual. I walked away with my 4 pork buns, 20 cents short of what I expected, without saying anything, in order to reflect upon this trauma and wondered if I should contact my therapist for an emergency session. A couple of things went through my mind:

I'll firebomb the place for overcharging me!! (just kidding – didn't even cross my mind, thanks to the progress I've made under my therapist's guidance)
It was packed with tourists and perhaps the manager forgot the deal I had been getting.
They have a new, unannounced pricing schedule.
He's being passive aggressive in saying he doesn't want my business and I'm too thick to recognize it.

Whatever the truth is, I thought that I spend $468 a year ($3 x 3 times a week x 52 weeks a year) at this bakery, and for a mere 20 cents, they risk losing that revenue stream by alienating a steady customer. You've heard it before: “It's not the money; it's the principle of the matter.” You have also heard that customers vote with their wallets and their feet: they walk over to the other bakery, taking their $468 with them. Customers don't always speak up. Many of them vote with their wallets and feet instead. They will tell others about their bad experiences much more than about their good ones. And there you are, staring at your financials at the end of each month wondering why there's a steady erosion in your revenues. Okay, so what's this got to do with you buying your business? Plenty. When you buy an existing business, you're usually also buying a customer base – along with physical assets, such as fixtures and equipment. You want to find out from the seller if there are certain steady customers with certain expectations or special deals – and make sure you keep those unwritten agreements. Hey, this is better than being an early investor in Google: for 20 cents, you keep $468 coming in each year.

FYI: 411 on RSS

Acquireo — Mon, 01 May 2006 07:44:00 +0000

Some of you are wondering what RSS is, how you can use it, and how it can make life easier for you. You got 2 choices: Read the full-blown RSS explanation we have on Acquireo, or read the 2 short paragraphs below and then choose one of the RSS feed readers. You want short paragraphs followed by easy action? Good. What does RSS do? It sends information from websites (such as Acquireo) to you, rather than you needing to go back to those websites to check for updates. It works really well on websites where the information changes or is updated constantly. For example, imagine you’re a hard-core news junkie, with 250 different news websites you follow. Instead of revisiting all 250 sites each hour, you use RSS to send headline updates – called feeds – to your RSS feed reader, your customized page for all your news updates. (It’s like having a web browser minimized on your computer.) Each feed is a link to the actual news report on that news website. In short, you track 250 news websites, keep updated automatically, and read only the stories you want in as many news categories your heart desires. Now for easy action: we made a list of popular feed readers for you to use. 5 recommended web based RSS feed readers Bloglines - A FREE online service for searching, subscribing, creating and sharing news feeds, blogs and rich web content. One can subscribe to RSS feeds of favorite blogs, and Bloglines will monitor updates to those sites. There is no software to download or install -- simply register as a new user and you can instantly begin accessing your account any time, from any computer or mobile device. Google Reader: A google account required to read a feed, Easy to use. Provides features to share one's feed subscription with others. Automatically gets the latest news and updates for your favorite sites http://www.newsburst.com/ Get news, weather, blogs, alerts, search results, cartoons, shopping lists, price notifications and other content from all around the Web. Read latest news and subscribe to feeds. One can send the feed by email to friends. http://www.rojo.com At Rojo you can tag a feed—which means labeling it with a key word, such as technology or music. This lets you easily scan just technology or music stories. Also allows user to share information with a network of contacts and very fast retrieval of feeds. http://www.feedbucket.com/: FeedBucket provides a quick and easy way to view RSS feeds. Enter an address in the text box and view the feed headlines. Registered users can store several feeds and view each feed individually or all of the recent top headlines at a glance in a "River of News" format. 3 Non web based readers http://www.sharpreader.net/ RSS and ATOM reader for Windows. Group feeds by category, integrate with Feedster to search blogs and feeds, import/export your subscriptions using OPML and more. http://www.jetbrains.com/omea/reader/ Free and easy to use non web based RSS reader, NNTP news reader, and web bookmark manager. It's fast, it aggregates, and it keeps you organized. Check out the additional features: lightning-fast desktop search, flexible information organizer, contextual access, and more. http://www.awasu.com/ Download the free, personal edition of Awasu. Customize the user interface and notification mechanisms, download podcasts, integrate blogging tools and more. Advanced and Professional versions with more robust features are available for a fee.

Site Improvements Update

Acquireo — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 00:40:00 +0000

We’ll occasionally post information on news and updates about Acquireo. Here are a few changes about site improvements we just made and how they help you: Searching for businesses for sale:

Buy a business search page: to help you search for businesses easier by searching by keywords and city, and to sign up for automated alerts (RSS feeds and e-mail alerts), all from one page. We've added auto suggest functionality to the location textbox to help you find businesses faster.
Advanced search page: you can use any or all of the following: keyword, category, city, state, zipcode, relocatable (or not), home-based (or not), and more.

Listing businesses for sale:

Business listing process: it's now more streamlined, faster, easier and, hopefully friendlier.
Listings optimized for search engine indexing: without even being on Acquireo.com, people can find your business listing on Google, Yahoo, MSN, and other search engines and directories. As you can see, we've also freshened up many of the pages throughout the site to help with navigation, usability, and to get your listings in the search engines.

We got a bunch of other stuff we're working on – we'll let you know when they're ready for you to use. Remember, we're working for you.

Curry in Ka’anapali

Acquireo — Mon, 10 Apr 2006 06:21:00 +0000

Taking one of my famous long walks in the neighborhood last Saturday afternoon, I ended up in front of the Great India Restaurant, reading the signboard they have out front: Buffet - $6.45. Since I was in the mood to stuff myself to the gills, I went in, grabbed a plate, and piled it dangerously high. An elderly Indian gentleman came to my table to fill my water glass and I asked him if it’s customary to eat with the right hand rather than using utensils. He explained that those in the south of India eat with their hands; in the north, where he’s from, they use a spoon. He asked where I was from and, wiping the saucy mess off my curried-stained fingers, I explained I grew up in Hawai’i but now live in San Francisco. I continued attacking my food with a spoon and three plates later, sat back bloated. After paying and ready to leave, another Indian gentleman named Lucky, who owns Great India, asked me if I was from Hawai’i, which I confirmed. He mentioned that he had just come back from a 14-day trip and is seriously considering opening a restaurant there. I shared some brief knowledge, such as Hawai’i restaurants attract both tourists and the locals who love to dine out. He likes the Ka’anapali resort area on Mau’i and did some intelligence work to see what competition he would face. This long story brings me to the topic of today’s brief post: whether to open a completely new business or buy a business for sale that already exists. There are a lot of factors to consider, but here are two rather relevant ones: your experience in running a business in that category (restaurant-Indian) and your experience in business in that geographic area (Hawai’i-Mau’i resort area). If you read my post on franchised businesses vs. independents, you know that a franchise already has a tested business model. The idea: follow the franchisor’s existing plan for your own success. Buying an existing business for sale that’s already running and profitable is similar: its business model has been proven in its market, and you’re getting an active customer list and a presence in the market. Great India owner Lucky already has his tested business model in his current location. The question is how the model can adapt to the new environment of Maui’s Ka’anapali, with few Indian people in the population to employ to give the restaurant’s cuisine an authentic taste and the atmosphere an authentic feel, a greater reliance on serving a changing tourist customer base rather than a steadily expanding local resident population, which leads to determining how to effectively curry the favor of tourists to dine in the short time they are in town on vacation. These are questions that Lucky will need to answer. Perhaps he already has. He has experience in the restaurant business. And with a name like Lucky, you know the odds for success are with him in his future expansion. Ultimately, you want your business to be wonderfully profitable. At the same time, do you want to strain and struggle on the path to that profit level when you could have taken an easier road by buying it?

Gathering intelligence the old-fashioned way: Ask!

Acquireo — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 03:50:00 +0000

I remember from my surfing days an Australian who was in town to do construction management for an executive’s new luxury home. During the weekends, he would surf. (He flew in his surfboards with him from Sydney.) One of his philosophies was really simple: “You don’t ask, you don’t get.” I like that. It’s simple. And it works. Apply this to gathering intelligence. If you’re thinking about buying a business, it’s good to go into the situation with as much understanding you can get. Even the simplest business has some tricks of the trade that, if used, make your life a lot easier. Where do you get this intelligence? You ask. You can always find people who will gladly give you info about their business. During slow periods, they will usually be glad to talk about what they’re doing. If you ask questions out of curiosity, you’ll get open and honest answers as long as they are not being asked to reveal deeply confidential business info. Ask enough over time and you can learn a lot: the nature of the customer base and who the prime customers are, how the business goes about selling itself, what their current challenges are (usually this has to do with finding more customers, but sometimes it’s about competition, employees, or the landlord not fixing a leak), and what the owner’s dreams are in owning the business. Gather more intelligence over time from various sources, separate the wheat from the chaff, and you’ll start to have good ideas coming from a number of businesses which you can use to evaluate candidate businesses for sale. You’ll be able to see rather quickly what the current owners have and haven’t been doing well or not at all, where you can make adjustments once you buy the business, and go ahead with buying a business, knowing you have wonderful, fresh ideas to bring to it. That will give you the confidence to succeed mightily. And that attitude of confidence is the important intelligence you can bring to your new business. But you got to ask.