Our approach
The Lakeshore Readiness Map.
Every buyer — the competitor down the road, the private-equity roll-up, the manager buying you out — examines the same five things. Most owners have never seen their business through that lens. We make it the whole engagement.
Financial credibility
Can a stranger trust your numbers without trusting you?
Clean monthly closes, revenue the buyer can trace, margins that survive scrutiny, and owner add-backs documented rather than argued. Messy books don't just slow a deal — they reprice it.
Owner-dependence
If you took a month off, what breaks?
Buyers pay for a business, not a job with your name on it. We systematically move knowledge, relationships, and decisions out of your head and into people and process.
Customer durability
Can one phone call sink the deal?
Concentration is the silent discount: one customer over 20–25% of revenue and the offer drops. We work the mix, the contracts, and the relationships so no single call can sink the deal — or the business.
Team & process
Will the key people stay — and does anyone else know how it runs?
Buyers ask two questions about your people: will the key ones stay, and does anyone besides the owner know how things run? Documented roles, sensible incentives, and a bench the buyer can believe in.
The deal file
Is every document ready before anyone asks?
Every contract, lease, license, policy, and statement diligence will request — assembled in advance. A complete file at the first meeting tells the buyer this owner is prepared, and prepared owners get cleaner terms, fewer retrades, and faster closings.
Know your buyer
Who's actually buying in Chicagoland.
Preparation only means something if it's aimed at the buyers you'll actually face. In this market, four kinds show up most often.
Roll-ups & platform buyers
Private-equity-backed groups consolidating trades, services, logistics, and niche manufacturing. Professional, fast, and ruthless about add-backs and owner-dependence. They've done this fifty times; most sellers are doing it once.
Strategic & competitor buyers
The company across town that wants your customers, your crew, or your territory. Often the best price — and the biggest confidentiality risk. Process discipline matters most here.
Individual buyers & searchers
Operators and search funds buying one good business to run. Financing-dependent, diligence-heavy, and very sensitive to clean books and transition support.
Insiders & family
Managers, partners, or the next generation. The friendliest conversation and the most underprepared deal — readiness work protects the relationship as much as the price.
The working style
Done with you, at your business — not to you, from a tower.
In person, on site
We work where the business actually happens — the shop floor, the warehouse, the back office. Chicagoland only, on purpose.
Plain English
Scorecards and fix lists a busy owner can act on, not binders that gather dust.
Your advisors stay yours
We're CPAs by training, so we work with your CPA in their own language rather than replacing them. They keep the books, the tax work, and your trust; we carry the exit workload they don't have bandwidth for — and we'll tell you when you need a stronger bench.
Confidential by default
No signage, no announcements, no loose talk. Most teams never know an exit is being prepared.
Start here
See your business the way a buyer will.
The free Owner Consult is thirty minutes and covers your timeline, your rough numbers, and your likely gaps across the five lenses.