The Art of Reinventing and Selling Businesses with Tracy Gunn

Ever imagined an escape route from your own business? In this episode of the Dead Pixels Society podcast, guest Tracy Gunn of Get Exitable has not only dreamed it, but she also lived it. Gunn was at a point where she was juggling multiple businesses, feeling trapped, and desperately wanting out. And no, her way out was not just shutting down; she reinvented her businesses and made them so appealing that they attracted potential buyers. Listen to Gunn's journey from business revamp to its successful sale.

But, as we all know, selling a business is not easy. It requires strategic planning, organizational skills, and a whole lot of creativity. Gunn shares her insights on how she shifted her focus on building her assets, and her healing process from the hassles of running multiple businesses. She emphasizes the importance of maintaining a positive outlook about your business to potential buyers, even if it feels like the biggest headache in your life. 

We also explore the often overlooked aspects of selling a business - what do the buyers really look for? Are there any underappreciated factors that can make a business more appealing? Gunn shares her thoughts on these questions and more, including possible alternatives to selling, like mentoring a successor or taking a year off to enjoy the business before passing the baton. 

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Chapters

• 0:02 Fixing a Business for Sale
• 9:40 Transitioning and Selling a Business
• 13:18 Navigating Business Transitions and Exit Strategies
• 17:59 Factors Buyers Consider When Evaluating Businesses

Transcript

Erin Manning: 0:02

Welcome to the Dead Pixel Society podcast, the photo imaging industry's leading news source. Here's your host Ga ry Pageau. The Dead Pixel Society podcast is brought to you by MediaClip, Advertek Printing and IP Labs.

Gary Pageau: 0:18

Hello again and welcome to the Dead Pixel Society podcast. I'm your host, Gary Pageau, and today we're joined by Tracy Gunn, who's from Get Exitable, and Tracy's coming to us from New Hampshire. Hi Tracy, how are you today?

Tracy Gunn: 0:31

I'm wonderful Hello from New Hampshire Yay.

Gary Pageau: 0:35

You've got an interesting story. As a business owner who ran multiple businesses and was trying to find a way out, can you share the story of how that experience led into what you're doing now?

Tracy Gunn: 0:49

Absolutely so. I was like many of you. You know, small business owner often have ADHD. You know I want more of this. So I started with the candy store, then I wound up with a restaurant, then I did another restaurant, then another candy store, because, you know, business ADHD. And one day I just was done. I just had hit the wall. I was standing in my bar, it was closing time, you know, and A little sunny, sunny plain closing time.

Tracy Gunn: 1:19

Exactly, and I was like frustrated with my staff and I was like tired of, like, my customers and all the things that I had, you know, looking around it, the prison, I mean the business I had built for myself, and I just thought I don't want to do this anymore. And so for me, I just thought, oh, I'll hire a broker, he'll help me, I'll get out of this, I'll be able to do what I want to do. Right, because that's what most of us we start these things usually because we want some kind of freedom, right. And so I hired a broker and his name is Bill and he's a nice man but, like I say, laid it all out for him, like here's what I want to do, I want to sell. I had all these dreams of exiting and he was like, sorry, tracy, you know, your best bet is just to liquidate, there's nothing really worth selling. And it killed. It was like a punch in the gut.

Tracy Gunn: 2:11

Like are you kidding?

Gary Pageau: 2:13

How long had you been doing this?

Tracy Gunn: 2:16

So I had had the candy first candy store for 12 or 13 years at that point. I had had the restaurant, one for three years, one for two years, and a new candy store was only like a year old, and this pre COVID. But I just, you know, I kept thinking, like every business owner, like I can do this, I got this, it's fine, everything's fine. And then I had a grand baby and everything kind of shifted like well, I want to go, or whatever. So when he basically said I couldn't do anything with it and he couldn't help me and he was like going to be my, you know, hero fixer.

Gary Pageau: 2:53

He was supposed to be working for you. It was supposed to be, yeah, and I just was like and his incentive would be to get you the most money possible as a broker.

Tracy Gunn: 3:01

Not tell me to liquidate, I mean. So I'll be honest. I cried a little.

Gary Pageau: 3:07

And then I just thought to myself yeah, you feel bad for me, right.

Tracy Gunn: 3:11

And the thing is, I think this is I mean, that's his job, right? His job is to sell businesses and he obviously wants a job that's easy, not hard, and my businesses would have been hard for him to sell. So what I figured out for me was that I could. You know what? I built it? I had sales, I had customers Like it can't all be bad. And so I gave myself six months to fix it, like to fix the things. Whatever he was seeing that I wasn't seeing, and what he wasn't seeing that I did see.

Tracy Gunn: 3:42

I was going to just fix the things and I gave myself six months, and so I'll be honest, like it was hard. He took a lot of work and effort and research because I didn't have anybody helping me. I was just figuring it out. But, I'll tell you, I fixed some things really. Some were really fast, Some took a little longer, but I found a buyer in three months.

Gary Pageau: 4:02

So what were those things that you because you had to basically reevaluate your businesses- right. You had to look at yourself outside, take the emotion, what I was going to say. So what were, like, the top three things you saw that said, okay, if I fix this, this and this, it's a more appealing as a business.

Tracy Gunn: 4:19

Yeah. So first I mean first, even before I started fixing anything, I had to see what did he not see right? Because I saw value there. We had money coming in and it was almost a million dollar a business, top line business. So like what, what was I missing? So I did like take a step back and think, okay, what am I missing? That's not that like what. He can't see the value right. So that was number one. And then number two is I kind of like thought, well, what do I want Right? Do I want to just liquidate? Cause I could have, I could have just lit a match and walked away. I mean, that was a possibility.

Gary Pageau: 4:55

I mean, there's nothing wrong with that. People do that all the time. All the time. That's not what you wanted to do. You're a builder, not a liquidator.

Tracy Gunn: 5:02

Correct. So I was like, okay, first, what do I want? So I chose what I wanted. I was going to fix it six months. I gave myself a deadline and then number two, and then I wanted to sell it for something. It didn't have to be millions of dollars, but I wanted to get something back. Right, I put all this effort in, gave up time, money, energy, you know, family events, all that stuff. Right, I wanted to get paid back in some way. And so I figured out what I wanted. I figured out. Then I thought, okay, he says my valuation zero. Why, what am I missing?

Tracy Gunn: 5:36

So I didn't have great profitability cause, like most business owners, I use my business like a paying bank and I reinvested in it and it was on the newer side, so I was still paying off things. So I knew I'd increase profitability. I knew that I was too involved in my business and I need to set up some better systems that could get me out of it. So that was the second part. So I knew I did identify what I was going to fix.

Tracy Gunn: 6:00

But I also identified what were my main pain points, like what made me want to pay someone to take this away from me, what made me want to set it on fire and walk away. And so I identified those and so I knew that if I could figure out those couple things it wouldn't be so painful every day, I wouldn't feel so done. And so those are the three things and I figured out what would I want, what was I missing in the valuation piece, understanding what is it worth and why the pieces that put that together, and what could I fix quickly and what did I really need to fix for my own mental health. So those are kind of the three things that I did, and I did that the first month. Like the first month I just dove into those things.

Gary Pageau: 6:48

For example, you bought some equipment. You're paying on because you're expecting to have this restaurant around for a while. But now you're realizing, oh my gosh, now I have got too much money going in to pay this up. So what do you do?

Tracy Gunn: 6:59

So I'll give you an example. So first, sometimes tech has some of the answers. So, for example, one thing that makes a business valuable is knowing who your customers are, having a good database or a way to communicate with them. And so I, as a bar, we had a POS system that was not tracking my customers. Now most people use a credit card. You have their information.

Tracy Gunn: 7:22

So we instituted that I already own. All I had to do was teach my staff to set up our loyalty program. Now I could tell you who came in, how often, how much they spent, right, and I had a way to communicate with them, make them an offer, get them in this week. We're doing this thing right. So all of a sudden, I threw tech that I already own, just had to turn it on and teach my girls who, frankly, they were able to give a free appetizer for signing up, customers, happy staff, because I had waitresses staff happy. And now I have the data All of a sudden, now I have a couple thousand people of regular customers that I can know who they are, what they order, what they like. I mean all that info that I hadn't tapped into before.

Gary Pageau: 8:10

Because that's one of the things I think. When people look at selling their business, they tend to look at the fixed assets and things they don't look at the customer base. It is the actual asset that they kind of overlook that. But that's actually probably what you're selling is the customer base.

Tracy Gunn: 8:26

Yeah, because if those people stop coming, right food changes and most if you have people who are coming on a regular basis, if you transition and you have a new owner but they don't like them as much and the food changes, right that the business could be gone just like that. So I had to make it not about Tracy, but about the consistency and about really connecting the business to them right To build in some loyalty, and sometimes that requires giving. But let's be honest, I mean, in a restaurant, what is an app cost eight, nine bucks, but then they buy dinner and drinks. It was a big bar and they consider you and you've now given something. Well, now there's a little bit of reciprocity.

Gary Pageau: 9:13

Right right.

Tracy Gunn: 9:13

Which is great. So that was one thing that I did and that again, I already had the tech.

Gary Pageau: 9:20

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 9:21

So who are your customers? Where do you find them? How do you communicate with them? Do they gather? Do they gather with me, Like can? I communicate with them. Those are things to think about.

Gary Pageau: 9:30

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 9:31

Because, again, when you're in it and doing all the time, it's hard to do that right, it's hard to just get outside of it. And now I had a reason and I will say this For me once I decided I want to be done. It was a shift of working 16, 18 hour days on the business, in the business. I took a lot of that time and shifted it towards exiting the business.

Gary Pageau: 9:57

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 9:58

Whether or not it was going to work. But I just took that energy and shifted it, so now I could work on those things that would build my assets, that would build my profitability.

Gary Pageau: 10:10

Because there's a lot of people who, sadly, in the photo industry, who have retail locations or operations yeah, and they're not set up for that, unfortunately, and when it comes time to sell, whether they've had a family event or they've just reached retirement age or they've just burnt out, they're not in a position to sell, sadly enough. So you were very fortunate. Did you get what you wanted or did you have to settle?

Tracy Gunn: 10:38

I settled a little, but I got what I wanted, in the sense that I was able to get out because I had four businesses I was trying to fix right, not just one. So I took the biggest headache and I just dedicated my time and energy there so that I could, because that was the one that was taking the most time, it was the newest, it was the biggest, it was the one that I thought should be worth the most. And so you know, and honestly, part of that whole planning process is who's gonna buy it? Right, thinking about that in your plan of Okay, if I'm gonna sell, who the heck's gonna buy and who might be, and then thinking about what would they be looking for?

Gary Pageau: 11:15

right, marketing 101, because what you're really saying is you're finding a customer For to buy your business, right? You're not. So you have to make it appealing to them and you have to kind of visualize who's gonna buy it right Now. Now, was the person the purchaser of the restaurant specifically, were they customer or Sitting on my?

Tracy Gunn: 11:36

bar because I had been talking again. I was very in my business meaning, like you know, it was a 6,500 square foot bar restaurant. I mean the bar sat 40.

Tracy Gunn: 11:46

So I was out there chatting and making sure things were going in, because I didn't have management in place Because I just wasn't there, but I had, like a bar manager, a kitchen match, so I had people, but just I was always out there and friendly and chatting and I was talking about what I was doing. Even then, this guy, the fascinating part was this guy had never owned a business before. This is what he wanted to do with his retirement. No, I know what he's crazy, but the thing is is like, because when restaurants hard, it's hard, I mean it's, I mean all businesses hard, but restaurants a lot of work and the margins are not. You think there's margins but there's not a lot of margin. And so anyway, and he approached me, I was just talking about he's like, would you sell it to me? And I was like, really, yeah.

Tracy Gunn: 12:36

I mean. So it just goes to show you never know, like, and if you're putting out there like we're thinking about we like I'm trying to fix it because I got want my grandbaby and there's nothing wrong with the business, like I'm not saying like I hate my life, I hate my business. You know that's probably not a good idea to go out and talk about how you hate your business.

Tracy Gunn: 12:54

Well but you know, I want to retire, I want to go see my grandbabies. Those are good things, those are just life transitions. I want to retire, right, but I built this amazing thing and I want to see it continue right not only for me, but for Economy, for my town, for my community, for my customers. All those reasons I'm, you know, a little different.

Gary Pageau: 13:18

So you had the restaurant, you also had another eating establishment. Did that go with it, or how did you handle that?

Tracy Gunn: 13:25

It did not that one. And all this happened right before COVID, and so the the other restaurant I actually went up liquidating only because I, my landlord, decided they wanted to control my hours and it was during COVID and I was open and actually really I was making money, I was profitable as an airport restaurant, and the landlord decided they I had to be open certain hours and I Said no, thank you. And so they basically told me I could bid on my own restaurant, because I didn't own it and it was an airport restaurant. It's not like I could have moved it down the block Right, so I was kind of stuck.

Gary Pageau: 14:03

They knew that they wanted to play hardball.

Tracy Gunn: 14:04

They got me Yep, and so and I just I'm a little bit stubborn and I just thought, no, you're not gonna dick. I did not go into business for you to decide what's best for my business. And it was.

Tracy Gunn: 14:15

I was actually my city owned the airport and so I just thought, no, we're gonna let it go. And so so that one I liquidated. So I've actually Done a purchase I've done, I mean, a sale, found the buyer, I did a liquidation and I did an earning from my candy store and another one I closed. So you know, I've done a little bit of everything. I've learned so much, which kind of led me to what I'm doing now, which Helping people to navigate this part and not only navigate like when they're ready to go, but but think about it way, way, way, way back when they start, because Exactly I had been smarter or really thought about Not only how I wanted to grow it, but why I wanted to grow it to a certain level, in in a certain way, and been more educated, I would have made different decisions right.

Gary Pageau: 15:10

Exactly, that's one of the things I think is very important is that when you set up now set up the business, you have to organize it in such a way that you know that your outcome is the intention right. So, for example, you know if you plan on just shutting the door, then you do an LLC and you just right whatever. But if? But if you're planning on, let's say, your family taking it over, maybe you go with an S corp so you can issue stock and do some different things, and that's what I think a lot of people Overlook, that piece when they set up the business, because that's where all the energy is these days. Right, spia, business owner start up, this is great. But they don't do the back end. And, like you said, you were very fortunate a we're able to sell a giant restaurant before COVID. You will find a. You found a buyer relatively quickly, which again was probably great, because you know sometimes when you put a business up for sale, it can take a long time.

Tracy Gunn: 16:06

Well, and I mean you know not to be a downer, but you know they say biz by cell, says 85% of listed businesses don't tell. And that's for a lot of reasons obviously. Sometimes they're crappy businesses or sometimes they're really not businesses, sometimes they're just Jobs, sometimes like the profitability is not there, but other times there's often not enough buyers and that's kind of what. The other part of why we started doing this is that in the next five years all the boomers will retire. I mean, they're gonna be in their 70s and they're done, and so all of those businesses in the next five years 12 million up, I believe are Are going to be for sale in some way, shape or form. Most of those boomers need to sell to retire. But there's not enough buyers.

Gary Pageau: 16:58

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 16:59

So now we've got us not only thinking strategically about like, okay, if I'm gonna be up against 12 million other businesses, what's gonna make mine sell? How am I gonna be the 15%, not the 85%? Right, and I think we could shift that to 15%, to more like 40 or 50 if we talk to enough people.

Gary Pageau: 17:17

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 17:18

But I think also it's also opening up our minds to different ways to exit. Right, whether a lot of people you know sell or find, if people are gonna have to start being creative with financing, they're gonna have to get more familiar and more comfortable with how they exit. Because, like you said, you know, if I sold and I somebody gave me, you know, let's just say, $200,000 in cash, well I'm gonna lose a lot of money tax wise that way. So it doesn't always make sense to get it all up front. Sometimes you can collect interest over five years on a balloon paper. There's all different ways to do that, so that's a whole other discussion.

Tracy Gunn: 17:59

But I think, when you think about the fact that there's not enough buyers, like you said, it sometimes takes a long time. Sometimes it's because it's not a great business, or it's in a dying industry or it hasn't been set up. In a way and I talked to brokers a lot about this Like, don't just tell them to liquidate because it's gonna be hard. Maybe recommend them to us, we'll help them, like, and then magically they'll have a business that's sellable and it doesn't have to be as hard.

Gary Pageau: 18:27

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 18:28

So yeah, I mean, and so yes, it does take a long time and most don't sell. Eventually they just give up and they're just like you know, I'm just gonna liquidate for as much as I can. The long lasting bad part about that is that what happens to our economy of 12 million businesses? All right, so let's say 80% of them go away. What?

Erin Manning: 18:46

happens.

Tracy Gunn: 18:47

Right, like what happens to our chambers of commerce, what happens to our cities, what happens to our downtown, what happens because retail is big one. Retail and restaurant are big ones because they require people and people are hard to come by.

Gary Pageau: 19:04

Right, exactly what are buyers looking for in a business? Now, what? I personally think that there's gonna be a lot more interested in business ownership, because I think there are people who maybe they're doing DoorDash now and they're doing Uber and they're kinda doing the side hustle and they're getting a taste of that. Maybe they will want to buy business. So what are buyers looking for when they're evaluating a business? I mean, some people wanna do something completely different, some people think whatever. So what do you think are like the things that a buyer is looking for?

Tracy Gunn: 20:03

I think I mean. So it depends what kind of buyer. If I wanted to be a buyer of a business that I don't wanna run myself, I'm gonna only look at professionalized companies, in other words companies where the owner is not doing everything. Because if I buy that business that the owner is doing everything and overseeing everything, I'm gonna have to now do this or find somebody and some kind of operator to do that. And so doesn't mean it's off the table, it just means that's kind of maybe what I'm looking for.

Tracy Gunn: 20:35

But other people like I had a gentleman, michael, and he owned a restaurant company, a catering, and COVID was hard on him in Jersey for 35 years Now he had done millions and millions in sales. Prior. Covid was a rough one because people weren't gathering and he was doing a lot of catering, but he had those contracts and so he was discussing with us like, should I, shouldn't I? What is it worth now based on post-COVID numbers? But also, what do I have to do? What is it gonna take for me to be able to sell it and do I wanna do that? So we were doing that and some of my suggestions were him was like okay, if you want someone to just buy it out entirely. Fine, that's a very finite group of people.

Tracy Gunn: 21:21

But what if you had somebody that you could get from a culinary school who dreams of owning their own restaurants, and that you taught them all the things? Maybe you don't exit entirely, maybe you exit 50%, but you bring them up in it so they can now run it right. It's like adopting a kid who's gonna take it over. That is a possibility for people. He chose not to sell. Actually, he actually just decided to give himself a year. He's gonna enjoy the year and call it. And again, that's the thing about exit planning is like you at least weigh out all the options and think about who might this be? What am I willing to do? And you figure out those things and then you make a plan from that and there's nothing wrong with that. But for me it broke my heart a little because he had a 35 year old business With contracts in place. There's value there.

Gary Pageau: 22:12

Right, where you're building a catering business specifically and you're in a community for 35 years. You've got so much brand equity in that community that generations of people who have celebrated or whatnot are done and so they know the name, they trust it. You're right, there's a tremendous amount of value there.

Tracy Gunn: 22:30

There is, and it's just gonna poof, just disappear.

Gary Pageau: 22:34

And then we imagine he's just gonna do it and just be like he's gonna call it.

Tracy Gunn: 22:37

He's gonna turn the lights off and call it and sell it all and I mean that's his decision, right? We tried to talk him out of it because I love businesses and I hate to see him.

Gary Pageau: 22:45

We were tempted to buy into it, weren't you? Right, no, I you know the part of me, the.

Tracy Gunn: 22:50

ADHD person was like. Well, I thought about it for a minute because I didn't help.

Gary Pageau: 22:55

right now, don't lie, you did, you did.

Tracy Gunn: 22:57

But I mean, it's like that kind of thing. It's like geez, so like buyers are, look, it depends what they're looking for. So buyers that have bought before are looking for specific things. So, like from a seller perspective, I kind of came up with a list for myself that I actually share with our clients and that it's like I call it my seller's checklist and it's like okay, are you working in this business? Okay, how much? Right, if you are, what can you delegate? Who can you train? How can you replace yourself in this business?

Gary Pageau: 23:28

Right, is it?

Tracy Gunn: 23:28

transferable.

Gary Pageau: 23:30

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 23:31

Right, or is this a job?

Gary Pageau: 23:33

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 23:33

Because if it's a job, it's not really a business. I mean, that hurts a lot of people, but the reality is, if it's a job and you only do it like I had a, wolfgang was one of my solopreneurs who we did a workshop together and you know he had gotten rid of all of his staff and COVID and all that, and now he had to decide am I gonna bring them all back as subcontractors? He had all this equipment to be able to have something to sell, or do I just liquidate now? Right, and he decided to go all in and start to build back and get himself, because it was him and his wife, right? Well, they're not going with the business. That's the whole point of selling.

Gary Pageau: 24:12

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 24:13

I have another guy, jim, who is an electrician, and he was thinking in a couple of years maybe he was gonna sell it to. He was going to sell it to his employees, but his employees could only pay so much and he's like he's invested emotionally. So we came up with a plan for him and he actually just found a different buyer because he separated things. But one of the strategies was you know, you're of an age. There's a lot of people who do what you do in your town who also wanna exit. Why not scoop them up and then add them to yours? Now, all of a sudden, you've doubled and tripled your business and the value.

Gary Pageau: 24:50

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 24:51

So there's a lot of different ways you can do it. But so, okay, what are buyers looking for? They're looking for something that's transferable easily, right. Some people are looking for a fire sale, mm-hmm. Right. They're looking to say hey, you know, I heard a podcast the other day and she said you know, when my buyer she buys boring like old businesses like and so he said to her something from his AOL account and she was like oh, I wanna buy your business. It's like who is on AOL? Right, it's like, you know, that person probably has not kept up with the times, they probably have not instituted the tech that would make a lot of their job or life easier and more profitable, and they probably haven't raised prices.

Tracy Gunn: 25:34

So, there's a quick game if you buy a business, just by raising prices, making a new offer, because you know. I'll give you a story. My husband is a contractor, carpenter, and he's always worked for himself and he's just always worked on referrals and so. But he saw we do flips now and he had to hire someone and they were hiring at 75 bucks an hour and he had maxed out at like 45 and he was like they're charging what? And I said yeah, because you haven't come along with the times in the sense, like you, at this point, if you want need a builder, you need a plumber, you need a lecturer, you'll pay whatever they ask Because you need them to come.

Gary Pageau: 26:19

Right.

Tracy Gunn: 26:20

Whereas my husband is stuck a little bit back in the 80s and 90s right. But he has way more knowledge than any of these guys charging double what he was right. And that's the same as true in a business Like you get so in it, you're like nobody overpaid. That I'll tell you. I own a candy store. I charge $14 a pound for candy and my husband's like no one would pay that and I'm like they do every day. It's just a different mindset, right.

Gary Pageau: 26:47

Because it's funny to say I just had someone on the podcast. We're talking about the traditional. The currency of the photo industry used to be the four-bytes print, right, the snapshot, and this person was talking about how there is. There's so much value there that people don't understand that and people are charging 18, 17, 15 cents for that, when they could easily double it Because it's not as price sensitive as it used to be, Because it's a different value equation. Just like candy is right you can buy candy at any corner convenience store, at every gas station, whatever. But if I walked into Tracy Gung's candy shop, I would see something that I wouldn't see there and that's why it's $14 a pound.

Tracy Gunn: 27:33

Or 300 jars to pick from where you can make your own custom bed. I'm selling a service, not a product.

Gary Pageau: 27:39

Right, right, right.

Tracy Gunn: 27:40

That's a whole new conversation we have, it is another, but the point is is that no, but that's a great point, great point. You know, as a seller think about like what would a buyer be able to make their money back Right? Would the money go down the drain and over what period of time?

Tracy Gunn: 27:58

Right, I mean sometimes it's really fast because it's new eyes, new blood, new conversation, fresh, with more experience or a different experience, exactly In an old model, I mean. And so and the other thing I think to yourself is okay, if you're looking for a buyer, thinking about, like, if I handed this over, let's even, let's just say, the perfect buyer showed up today and they offered me a million dollars and I could walk away, would it fall apart if I left?

Gary Pageau: 28:28

One million dollars yeah.

Tracy Gunn: 28:31

So right, it's like would it fall apart.

Gary Pageau: 28:34

Yeah.

Tracy Gunn: 28:35

If I wasn't here with all the band-aids and making sure is it transferable? Because nobody wants to buy a business that's gonna fall apart. Nobody buys a business thinking it's gonna fail. It happens.

Gary Pageau: 28:49

Sure, but no one can go. But there's no business with the idea that it's gonna fail unless you're yeah, you know want to do it for tech reasons or something. I don't know anybody who does that except in the movies, yeah. So where can people go to reach out to you for more information about you and the types of programs you offer?

Tracy Gunn: 29:06

So getexitablecom is like our homepage hub and that'll kind of like get you in our little world. We do have an offer for your listeners if they wanted to start thinking about exit plan. And I say this with all sincerity it doesn't matter if you're thinking about like I wish I could sell yesterday, I wish I could sell next year or in 20 years. The simple fact is is you really should consider some type of plan, right? They say?

Tracy Gunn: 29:38

I used to have an airport restaurant and the pilots would say you know, if you take off, if you're just a little bit off, you're gonna wind up in Seattle instead of LA. If you're a trajectory, you need to know where you're going and you gotta have it like a pinpoint on a map, just so when you get off course, you have a way to correct right. And so that is true. Sorry, I'm bringing up my. I wanna tell you the right thing. So it's getexitablecom slash exit plan and I'll put a link on the homepage just so it makes it easier. But it's getexitablecom or traciguncom is me and I'm on all the socials, so let's be friends.

Gary Pageau: 30:20

Well, thank you, tracy, for your time and everything, and looking forward to reconnecting with you in the future.

Tracy Gunn: 30:25

I appreciate it. Thanks so much, everybody.

Erin Manning: 30:29

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