Four months have passed since we signed the agreement with our business broker (Marty), and nothing else has happened related to selling the business. I’ve talked to Marty a few times when he said he had some queries, but we haven’t met with anyone else, well, not until today. Marty asked if we wanted to talk to some potential buyers who were a real long shot, and I said sure, why not. That led to this morning’s meeting, which was one of the weirdest business encounters I can recall.
Marty set up a breakfast meeting for Jack and I to meet with a couple from a nearby state who have roots in this area. (Marty had a meeting out of town, and couldn’t attend the meeting.) They’re considering moving back to the area, and the husband has indirectly worked with many computer systems in his current work, while his wife has a lot of marketing experience. I don’t know this for fact, but during the meeting I got the impression that they have an abundance of money, they’re bored, and they’re trying to figure out what to do next in their lives.
Really, what this meeting reminded me of was the old television series “Hart to Hart,” where a rich couple (Stephanie Powers and Robert Wagner) went around solving crimes (for reasons I don’t remember). Except in our case the rich couple was thinking about buying a computer software business instead of solving crimes. At one point when I realized the meeting wasn’t going anywhere, I took a bio-break, and as I walked back to the table I looked around to see if their butler “Max” was in the restaurant, or waiting outside in their car.
Suffice it to say, nothing is going to happen here. I hate wasting our time this morning, but the whole meeting strikes me as so funny I can’t be upset right now. Plus, Marty warned me that this was a real long shot. This encounter makes me wonder how many people like this Marty talks to that we never hear from? That’s certainly one benefit of having a business broker when trying to sell a business.
