What Advisors Need to Know About Selling their Travel Agency
经过丹尼尔·麦卡锡(Daniel McCarthy)/
在强大的卖方市场和持续滚动的经济中,现在是旅行社所有者达到退休年龄的好时机。这是根据创新旅行收购的罗伯特·斯威尼(Robert Sweeney)的说法,这是一家位于亚特兰大的旅行和旅游商业经纪公司,专门从事销售代理商。
斯威尼说:“这是一个卖方的市场,因为供需,并且因为媒体对旅行社很友善。”“如今的人们为拥有零售旅行社而感到自豪。人们喜欢旅行。”
这是代理商所有者需要了解的有关潜在出售其旅行社的知识。
谁在买?
Most of the sales that Sweeney and his company deal with are business-to-business transactions, coming from people inside the industry. The other one-third are disenfranchised corporate Americans who are moving to become entrepreneurs and want to do so in an exciting, lucrative industry.
进入该行业的人比普通顾问年轻一点 - 40多岁的夫妇是最常见的人口统计之一。
“下一代即将来临,他们的生活方式很重要,而旅行对于拥有该类型业务的人来说是一个有吸引力的选择。这可能是非常有利可图的,有很多人在该行业赚了很多钱。”斯威尼说。
“我们越来越多地阅读有关在家工作的人们在那里做一百万美元的人,赚了六个数字,并享受生活。让一个不确定他们想购买哪种业务的人并不是一件很难的销售。”
我的代理商价值多少?
根据Sweeney的说法,有几个公式可以检查一个代理商的价值。
One good benchmark that buyers look at is the total discretionary cash of the business, including salary, profit, perks, and benefits. Once they get that number, doubling it will give buyers a good starting point for acquiring an agency.
Another good benchmark is calculating 45% of the annual gross profits, which includes total commissions, fees, mark-ups, and any other way that an agency makes money.
这两种方法都适用于较小的机构,在底线上没有大量利润。Sweeny说,当您到达大型机构时,这是一个完全不同的市场。
“大型企业机构现在是最有价值的we’ve ever seen,” he said. “They’ll get a significantly higher purchase price — up to five-and-a-half times the real earnings of the business. The thinking is that the corporate business is stickier than the leisure business.”
销售需要多长时间?
那些有兴趣出售的人应该知道这不是一个快速的过程。代理商应开始准备在实际想交出代理商的日期之前出售18个月。大多数买家希望当前的所有者在销售后待一年。
该过程包括在获得报价后对律师使用零。(在此之前,买方有责任提供出售合同。)律师将在那里审查合同。
卖家通常会犯什么错误?
首先,一些卖家倾向于高估其代理商的价值。根据Sweeney的说法,代理商拥有的最大资产是客户列表,其价值取决于其深度。
“If they are all new clients, it wouldn’t be as valuable. But it would be highly valuable in well-established agencies with firmly rooted business and loyal clients,” Sweeney said.
Outside of the client list, buyers typically are not interested in picking up a long lease for a brick-and-mortar location (though that’s not that uncommon), or a long GDS contract.
Second is that there is no point in limiting the pool of potential buyers. One of the bigger mistakes Sweeney has seen is an agency owner declaring that he or she would only sell the business to another member of the consortia they belong to.
“That’s like saying, ‘I want to sell my house, but only to someone who lives in my county,’” Sweeney said.
斯威尼说,理想的情况是,如果您正在考虑出售,则与买家进行两次认真的对话。
最后但对于潜在卖家来说最重要的是保密是国王。Sweeney补充说:“众所周知的一家企业价值不止一个待售的业务。”