Hello friend,
Why you're getting this: this is my Friends Newsletter; a brain dump of hard-won lessons from buying, selling, and occasionally ruining dozens of businesses.
This one’s for the founders doing $1M to $10M in revenue. Not theory. Not VC fantasy.
Just what real buyers like me actually look for when we write the check.
A few months ago, a founder doing $4.7M in revenue with $1.1M profit emailed me:
“We don’t want to raise VC.
We just want to sell to someone like Tiny.
How do we make this attractive without playing the banker game?”
I love founders like this.
Quietly profitable.
Emotionally ready.
Not trying to “raise a round” or fake their way through an AI pitch.
They just want a clean, grown-up deal.
So here’s what I told him.
This is exactly what we look for when we buy companies doing $1M to $10M in revenue.
Not a wish list.
A checklist.
Let’s kill the myth:
“We’re not profitable yet, but we’re growing fast.”
That’s cute.
It works in venture land.
It doesn’t work here.
We look for:
We want margin because margin gives us time to learn, breathe, and operate.
If you’re bleeding cash, we’re out.
Need help pressure-testing this?
👉 15-Minute Deal Evaluation: My Checklist for Spotting Winners
If I can’t explain it to a smart 12-year-old in one sentence, we’re not buying it.
Bad:
“We offer modular ML-powered digital transformation solutions for B2B ecosystems…”
Good:
“We help law firms stop losing client documents.”
The clearer your model, the easier it is to underwrite risk and hand it off to operators.
Confused buyers don’t buy.
A few red flags we see a lot:
We’ll still consider it; but the multiple goes down fast.
We love businesses where the founder can go on vacation for 30 days and no one notices.
If you’ve built something that runs without you?
Read this next:
👉 Thinking of Selling? 7 Signs Your Business Is Ready for a Quiet Acquisition
Everyone wants to talk about CAC.
We want to talk about LTV.
We’ll ask:
If you can show that people keep paying (and that retention improves with time), we get excited.
Because that’s not marketing. That’s a moat.
We’re not buying your hustle.
We’re buying your system.
We love:
If your org chart lives in your head and your ops manual is in your inbox, that’s a problem.
Make it transferable.
Want to see how I think about transition?
👉 What It’s Really Like to Sell to Tiny
This one’s squishy, but real.
We like:
We’ve walked from seven-figure EBITDA deals because the product felt off.
Not because we’re snobs.
Because it’s a signal: if you cut corners on branding, where else did you cut?
Some founders pitch us, then spend 60 minutes trying to convince themselves to sell.
You know what we love?
Founders who say:
“We built a great business.
We’re proud of it.
But we’re tired.
And we want to work on something else.”
Clarity is power.
If you’re ready to exit, say it.
And if you’re unsure, wait. Don’t dance.
Selling is hard enough without self-deception.
For a gut check on your readiness, read:
👉 Bootstrapped, Not Broken
We’re not trying to lowball you.
But we’re not SoftBank either.
What we’ll typically pay:
The fastest deals happen when both sides are rational.
We’re not trying to “win.”
We’re trying to buy great businesses at fair prices and run them forever.
That’s it.
We don’t need a 400-page data room.
But we do need:
We’ll bring operators, not lawyers.
We’ll ask questions.
And if something’s wrong, just tell us early.
Surprises kill deals. Imperfections don’t.
We’ve bought companies where the founder stayed 6 months.
We’ve bought others where they left after 3 weeks.
But the key is this:
The business must work without you.
That means:
If you want to leave clean, build that before you list it.
Need help mapping it? Read:
👉 The Boring Business Exit Checklist
Look, we’re not chasing unicorns.
We’re not looking for the next crypto-to-AI pivot.
We’re looking for:
If that’s you, we should talk.
And if you’re not quite there yet?
Now you know what to work on.
Because trust me; when buyers like Tiny show up, they’re not looking for magic.
They’re looking for margin.
Get Your Copy of Never Enough at https://www.neverenough.com
Or don’t.
Just go clean up your P&L and send us the one-pager when you’re ready.
– Andrew
