OWNERS

Care and stewardship of your life’s work is our life’s work

We know that many business owners shudder at the thought of selling to a competitor or strategic buyer. Many are equally wary of financial buyers who will treat the business as merchandise to be re-sold in a few years.

Just as you started and built your business to solve your customer's problems, we founded Kindred Partners to provide a better alternative when it comes time to sell. We invest from our balance sheet of permanent capital. This means we are flexible and fast in our decision making. More importantly, it means we can offer a forever home to your business.

We can also accommodate your preferences regarding your future role and involvement, whether that means a complete exit, an advisory role, or to continue leading with renewed vigor having shed some of the tasks that you least enjoy. Above all, we aim to earn a deserved reputation for being easy to work with and a trusted custodian.

Kindred Partners exists for those owners who are fanatics about their business. Owners who treat their business and its people like family. Owners who would never just auction if off to the highest bidder, but want the right bidder. Owners who will still care for their business long after it’s no longer theirs.

If you’re nodding along as you read this or if we can be helpful in any way, let’s talk. We’d love to hear your store and share ours.

REASONS TO SELL

Here’s an opinion you may not have expected: don’t sell. Hold onto your business for as long as you can.

If you own the type of business we are attracted to then you are in the fortunate position of owning a valuable asset. It might be a poor financial decision for you to sell a great business that you understand intimately.

With that said, we understand there are other motivations to consider a sale.

  • Liquidity and financial diversification.

  • Securing your family’s, and your team’s, future and legacy.

  • Exhaustion. Health.

  • Freedom and independence from the endless weight of responsibility.

  • Personal or family obligations.

  • Partnership breakdown or, conversely, a desire for partnership.

  • A requirement for more and/or different resources and capital.

  • You have found the right buyer.

OUR APPROACH

Our objective is to be a trusted partner and the first call for the sellers of special businesses who want to deal with a long-term custodian.

  • From remaining actively involved, shifting to a board or advisory role, to seeking a full exit, we are flexible regarding your future involvement.

  • We promise responsiveness, discretion, and transparency. We’re for handshakes, simplicity and collaborating to get to the finish line.

  • Your business’ culture and values, plus the welfare of your customers, team and community standing matter to us. Expect minimal disruption.

  • We will offer a fair deal. If you are selling purely to the highest bidder, with no regard for what happens after settlement, we’re not for you.

  • We will undertake standard due diligence, but our focus will be on what matters and moving quickly, rather than a prolonged cavity search.

  • Though we are engaged owners, to preserve the entrepreneurial impulse our subsidiaries enjoy autonomy and independence.

WHAT WE WON’T Do

We come to each new business from a place of humility. We will not:

  • Drag out and complicate the sale process - the ‘long no’. Nor will we rush you.

  • Act like renters. Renters don’t care about downside. Nor the long term.

  • Intend on reselling your business.

  • Mistreat your people, or needlessly interfere and meddle.

  • Extract every dollar and optimise for short-term results.

  • Apply the ‘lipstick and leverage’ model.

  • Presume that we know better than you and your team.

  • Mandate revenue or cost synergies.

  • Make sudden, disruptive changes.

  • Introduce needless bureaucracy.

  • Require excessive growth.

  • Unnecessarily relocate the business.

INVESTMENT CRITERIA

Our open mandate allows us to consider any opportunity, but these are our preferred criteria.

  • Simple business offering an essential and non-deferrable product or service to its customers. To us, boring is beautiful.

  • Long and consistent history of $1-10 million in annual cash earnings generated from a broad set of recurring customers at healthy margins.

  • High - ideally improving - returns on equity while employing little debt.

  • Favourable long-term prospects given a strong, defensible market position and durable value proposition.

  • Proven, aligned managers and engaged employees with low turnover.

  • Headquarters in Australia.

  • Full or partial sale, with a preference for a majority position in partnership with the existing or incoming management team.