CASE STUDY

An entrepreneur addresses the difficult question of when to sell his business:

I started my telecommunication business when I was 18, and I am going to be 47 this summer. It is a successful business and provides me with a good living. I love the technology. I love my employees. I love my customers (most of them). Yet each day I feel more and more unfulfilled in what I am doing.

At the risk of sounding arrogant, I feel like a big fish in a little pond, unchallenged and bored. I have a lot of business knowledge that I feel is being wasted here, just doing the same thing year after year.

I have tried some side ventures over the years without much success. I have also considered selling the business, but it is too large to be bought a local competitor-we do about $2.5 million a year-and too small to attract the attention of large companies.

Besides, I do not know what I would do if I did sell it. And will whatever I do next allow me to earn as much money as I am earning now? More important, will I like it, or will I regret letting go of the one thing I have had all my adult life?

Subject: Small Business Management

1)Do you agree that the entrepreneur's company is not sellable?

2)Are there any other options for the entrepreneur besides selling his business?