Mr. Kent Satrang

I had the pleasure of meeting Terry Monroe and Bill Fecht when Bill called to ask if I would be interested in acquiring a large chain of convenience stores in our market. This was the first strength of what makes American Business Brokers successful, they have an extensive and ever growing marketing network of potential buyers and sellers. Often, I hear of a chain in our region who sells and I never knew they were for sale. They “saved the brokers fee” by selling their life’s work to the person across the street. I always wonder how much money they left on the table, by simply not putting their business up for sale in a manner where their competitors can even enter into their final and most important sales transaction. Having a specialized broker makes even more sense, because their network is industry specific to the types of businesses that want to buy your life’s work. They have a pulse on the present expansion appetite that their network of buyers has.

Once I signed their confidentiality agreement, Bill passed me on to his partner Terry Monroe. Like most people in sales, Terry has a warm and friendly professional personality. However, it didn’t take more than a few minutes to realize that Mr. Monroe knew the ins and outs of the C-Store industry like no one I had met before. I thought, this guy could write a book on the intricate details of selling and buying a petroleum business. A few weeks later I found out Terry actually had written “The Art of Buying and Selling a Convenience Store”. To level the playing field, I went out, bought a copy, and quickly read it. While my wife said, it was perhaps the most boring book in print, I could not put it down. If you are interested in exiting, entering, or expanding in this industry, this book is necessary read. If you are serious and passionate about the convenience store industry as your vocation, you can un-level the playing field to your advantage, if read and understand every page. It is an easy read, but it details every step, so a transaction will successfully play out and when the keys are handed over, you can feel confident that if you work hard, you will achieve the ROI you had planned for.

Since beginning in this industry in 1981, I have purchased twenty different petroleum businesses. Every deal and every seller was unique. There are always bumps in the road and sometimes we run into roadblocks. The recent acquisition that we did with American Business Brokers & Advisors went very smooth, because Terry had thought ahead and what would have been a roadblock already was averted, because we had discussed the potential issue and we had a Plan B. Terry is a problem solver who has seen it all before and he has the ability to walk both sides through difficult issues.

I also really appreciate the technological advantage that buying a business through American Business Brokers & Advisors provides. Some businesses do their books in a non-traditional accounting format. Terry and Bill take great pictures and explain clearly, what is for sale. If needed their team will retype the financial reports to give you a few years history and the last 12 trailing months. This allows the buyer to view trends and these reports were all on a cloud format and very easy to view. His team put past environmental reports, past year’s income tax reports, real estate tax data, departmental financials, and organizational charts and I had constant access to these critical documents. He also clearly states EBITDA and other tools the seller feels are important to a potential buyer and their lender.

It is said that at the intersection of your passion and gifts lies true success. I am confident that you will not meet two more passionate people about our industry than Terry Monroe and Bill Fecht. The thing that makes them one in a million as brokers is that passion, but even more so, it is their education and their life experiences in our industry. I would highly recommend talking to American Business Brokers & Advisors if you are thinking about selling your life’s work. You won’t do better than Terry and Bill and their staff to represent you.