Nov. 3, 2022

Jill TenHaken knows from experience the decision to buy a business can be equal parts emotional and financial.

“Not all business owners look far enough ahead to provide for your exit and think about an exit plan,” she said. “It brings up mortality and what are you going to do next, so it’s a hard discussion.”

It’s also one she has had personally when the TenHaken family sold Click Rain, the business her husband, Paul, built from the ground up.

“I feel like business owners need that support because it does rock your world,” she said.

TenHaken’s background is in sales and marketing, including graphic design. She has held corporate roles at the former Home Federal Bank and the electronic medical software business Solarity, among others, but left full-time work after the birth of her third child.

“I knew I was doing the right thing for our family, and the intent was to come back when Nora was in kindergarten, and then Paul got this little job,” she laughed.

Paul TenHaken was elected mayor in 2018, “so in the process of encouraging Paul to do this, I knew what that meant,” she said. “That meant I wouldn’t be going back for a while.”

About a year ago, she was introduced to Brian Slipka, the franchisee of a Minneapolis-based broker office that’s part of the global network Sunbelt Business Advisors, and was drawn to the opportunity to help build the business in Sioux Falls.

“It was the need for the service and knowing I could bring value to someone going through that situation,” she said. “We help people buy and sell businesses.”

She joined the Sioux Falls office earlier this year after becoming licensed in real estate. The office at The Plaza, 101 S. Phillips Ave., held its ribbon-cutting today.

Headquartered in Ohio, Sunbelt has offices nationwide, and the Minneapolis-based franchise has been honored with multiple awards for its performance companywide. Sunbelt markets itself as selling more privately held businesses than any other brokerage franchise worldwide.

The Minneapolis brokerage, which includes Minnesota, portions of Wisconsin and Illinois as well as some work in North Dakota and the new Sioux Falls office, does more transactions by number and volume than any other Sunbelt brokerage.

In addition to being a franchisee for Sunbelt, which mostly works with businesses generating $5 million in revenue or less, Slipka founded True North Mergers & Acquisitions to support those with more revenue and deals with a different pool of buyers. Slipka also is a partner in the Sioux Falls Canaries.

“Sunbelt is really about helping that Main Street small-business owner,” said Sunbelt Midwest president Chris Jones. “It’s mass confidential marketing. The broker is really a matchmaker, qualifying the buyer, bringing in someone the owner feels really good about and maximizing the chance of success of the buyout. Our core value is help people and success will follow.”

Slipka was born in Sioux Falls and visited the city often while growing up in southeast South Dakota. When the opportunity to acquire the Canaries led him back to the community, “it was natural to double down” by bringing Sunbelt to the city, he said.

“Sioux Falls is positioned extremely well because of the unpinning fundamentals, what makes business flow, velocity, and the torque of elements of business is super strong here,” he said. ”We want to be part of it.”

The climate for business buying and selling is still strong, Jones and Slipka said.

While typically three years of financials would be used in evaluations, the buyer market is treating 2020 “like a one-time event” and focusing on 2021 and 2022 performance, along with projections, said Jones, who Slipka describes as “a titan of the industry.”

“If a business is still profitable, it’s still a seller’s market,” Jones said, adding though that financing is beginning to tighten and sellers might be asked to provide additional financing to make a deal work.

“You’re going to see a flight to quality,” Slipka added. “So capable buyers with a lot of liquidity or cash to deploy or deep waters they swim in with capital capabilities are going to be uniquely positioned.”

In TenHaken’s first months with Sunbelt, she has worked with both prospective owners looking to acquire businesses and those looking to sell.

For buyers, either they’re an existing business looking to grow through acquisition, or “they just want their own gig,” she said. “They want their own thing. I have one buyer that’s just moved here internationally and just could have gotten a job anywhere but wants to have his own business.”

On the sales side, she just closed her first transaction – a local retail shop where the owner was looking at retirement, and TenHaken was able to find a buyer.

“Buyers came in that were passionate about the industry and had always wanted their own shop,” she said. “So that was fun. Where I really see the value of a business broker is if they’re going to close shop and they could have gained from all the work they’ve put in there.”

Sunbelt offers a free value-range assessment for businesses, “and at that point, they can decide whether to engage,” she said.

Using the firm’s broader network, TenHaken is able to collaborate with brokers who specialize in certain industries.

Right now, for instance, she’s working with an accounting practice and an optometry clinic looking to sell – both areas where Sunbelt has specialists.

“There are 40-plus brokers in Minneapolis that I work with on a daily basis and one – me – here, but they’re great resources,” TenHaken said, adding the hope is to add brokers in Sioux Falls as demand supports it.

“At this point, it’s just creating awareness of it,” she said. “I know the demand is there.”