Built for owners selling for the first time
Most owners are focused on the traditional exit strategies.
This lunch covers the paths they usually discover too late.
Most first-time sellers still think there are only two paths: sell to private equity or hire a broker and hope the market shows up.
But in today’s market, owners have more options than that, including structures that let them take chips off the table, improve the business before a sale, or run a more competitive process without giving up control too early.
Over a 90-minute lunch, we’ll walk through the options, the tradeoffs, and the real numbers we’re seeing in 2025 and 2026 transactions.
This lunch is for owners who are
- Considering a sale, recapitalization, or succession plan in the next 12 to 36 months
- Generating meaningful EBITDA and wondering what buyers would actually pay for
- Unsure whether to talk to PE, hire a broker, improve the business first, or wait
- Trying to understand the process before giving anyone a mandate
30-second RSVP. 15 owners per lunch. Invitation required.
No cost. No buyer introductions. No obligation. Just the audit, the market view, and a private room of owners thinking through the same decision.
Who else is being invited
- Pest control business owner, ~$2.2M EBITDA
- Pool services business owner, ~$1.8M EBITDA
- Residential roofing owner, ~$4.2M EBITDA
- Plumbing, HVAC, landscaping, fire protection, restoration, and solar owners across Phoenix metro
You will be surrounded by peers working through the same scenarios we are going to discuss.
All attendee information is anonymized. We share business types and ranges so you know the room is relevant, not to disclose who is attending.
Dates and venues
Where we stand
Next Chapter was built for owners selling for the first time, especially founder-led service businesses where the owner wants straight answers before deciding whether to sell, recapitalize, or wait.
Our job is to help you understand what sophisticated buyers will see, where they will push, and what you can fix before they do.
For the right business, at the right time, private equity may be the best path to your highest outcome. The key is knowing when that is true, and when another path creates more value.
What you will leave with
- 1Personalized Exit Readiness Audit.
Buyers now use AI, search, website signals, hiring data, reviews, and public information to form a view of your business before they ever speak with you. We will run the same type of audit and give you the report.
- 2The 3 to 5 factors most likely to move your multiple.
Specific to your business, your vertical, and your current positioning. Not generic “clean up your financials” advice.
- 3A current view of the market in your vertical.
Recent transactions, public-market trends, capital flows, and buyer appetite. Not a formal valuation, but a clearer view of what the market is rewarding right now.
What we will cover over lunch
- How owners are creating value before they sell.
A live example from a $250M solar owner who added $3M of EBITDA in 24 months, without simply selling more solar.
- What the best buyers paid for in recent home-services deals.
A walk-through of one of the highest multiples paid for a residential home-services company in 2023, where Next Chapter served as sell-side advisor.
- How AI changes the sale process.
What buyers are already using AI to evaluate, what you can fix before they look, and a few practical tools your team can copy the next day.
What this is not
This is not a sales pitch. We are not asking you to sign anything. We are not bringing buyers into the room. There are no breakout sessions, no hidden discovery calls, and no canned presentation about “maximizing value.”
We will spend the first 30 minutes on the market, the exit paths, and the numbers. The rest of the lunch is reserved for owner questions.
At the end, we’ll offer a private 1:1 for anyone who wants to go deeper. If you want it, great. If not, you leave with the audit, the playbook, and the same information either way.
About your host
Ewing Gillaspy spent 15 years in software, taking six products and businesses from a cold start to more than $1M in revenue.
At IBM, he was one of the first people selling artificial intelligence into enterprises like American Express, years before AI became a mainstream business topic. At this lunch, he will show practical AI workflows owners can use immediately to improve visibility, efficiency, and buyer perception before a sale.
After leaving software, Ewing became an operator. He later partnered with longtime sales leader and mentor Mark DeChant after both saw, firsthand, how poorly the traditional broker model serves many owners selling for the first time.
Next Chapter was built for that gap: the difference between how brokers want to sell your business and how operators would sell it if they knew the playbook.
Mark and Ewing personally lead every engagement. Active engagements across roofing, concrete, pool services, specialty lending, digital LED, and music production.
Every attendee leaves with
- A personalized web-valuation audit, built with the same tools buyers will use on you.
- A full battle plan from here to exit. The options, the strategies, and the tactics within your control to drive enterprise value as high as it can go.
Our goal: when you leave, you understand the sale process well enough to never be dependent on a broker.
If you eventually decide you want help running the process, that is where our advisory work begins. But the lunch is designed to be valuable whether you ever hire us or not.
30-second RSVP. 15 owners per lunch. Invitation required.
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