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About
Aston Finch provides independent, fixed-fee exit-readiness reviews for owner-managed businesses in the United Kingdom. We are not brokers, and we do not sell businesses.
Most advice available to an owner-managed business arrives once a transaction is already in motion. By then the questions are set by other people, and the owner is responding rather than deciding.
Aston Finch exists to occupy the quieter period beforehand: the years in which an owner is thinking about the future without having committed to anything. Our work is to describe the business accurately, identify what would complicate a future sale or succession, and set out what could sensibly be done about it.
We do one thing, for one fee, and we are content for the answer sometimes to be that nothing needs to happen yet.
Approach
The choices available to an owner narrow as a process gets closer. Information that arrives while there is still time to act on it is worth considerably more than the same information delivered under pressure.
Once a sale process starts, everyone in the room has a position. Working before that point means the assessment can be plain, and the owner can consider it without an audience.
We are paid for the review, not for what you decide afterwards. There is no success fee, so there is no commercial reason to encourage a transaction that is not in your interests.
A business that could be handed over is usually a better business to own: less dependent on one person, easier to manage, and more resilient if circumstances change unexpectedly.
Owner-managed businesses are run by people who are expert in what they do, not in corporate finance. A review that needs translating has failed. We write in plain English and explain our reasoning.
Working with other advisers
A readiness review is not a substitute for the professionals who already know your business. Accountants and solicitors hold the history, the detail and the relationships. Our contribution is a specific one: an independent view of how the business would look to a buyer or successor, and what should be addressed first.
We are glad to work alongside existing advisers, and the written findings are designed to be shared with them. Referrals from accountants and solicitors are welcome.
If you are considering your options, or simply want a clearer view of where the business stands, an initial conversation is a sensible place to begin.
Fixed fee: £995. No success fees. No obligation.