Provider Directory

Prairie Capital Advisors

Downers Grove, IL

Prairie Capital Advisors is a leading financial advisory firm specializing in creating and executing ownership transition strategies for middle-market companies nationwide. Supports businesses with evaluating an M&A buyout alongside an ESOP buyout structure

BDO Capital Advisors

BDO Capital Advisors, LLC, a wholly-owned affiliate of BDO USA, is a leading middle market investment bank that focuses on sell-side advisory, acquisition advisory, capital raising and board advisory services with offices located throughout the United States. The BDO Capital ESOP Advisory team consists of professionals with a wide range of experience in investment banking, tax, valuation, benefits and commercial banking. Our ESOP professionals work closely and collaboratively with your accounting and legal teams to achieve the result everyone wants: a sale that benefits the company, protects your legacy, and provides both you and your employees with the financial rewards you have worked hard to earn.

Jason Wiener | p.c.

Boulder, CO

Legal and business consulting for mission-driven companies, social impact, and environmental enterprise.

ICA seeks to change the nature of work by advancing businesses and institutions that center worker voice, grow worker wealth, and build worker power. We seek to create, promote, and support jobs, while collaborating with workers to define a truly entrepreneurial, democratic, and community-minded economy.

Apis & Heritage Capital Partners

Washington, DC

Apis and Heritage Capital Partners (A&H) converts profitable companies from private ownership to 100% employee ownership through our Employee-Led Buyout (ELBO) transaction model using a private credit instrument. We are pioneers in a new asset class with a track record of delivering strong financial results to investors and meaningful positive societal impact.

SES ESOP Strategies

Bala Cynwyd, PA

SES ESOP Strategies is a national ESOP firm that combines the expertise of ESOP consulting, financial, investment banking and legal professionals to assist companies in creating and maintaining successful, sustainable employee ownership results throughout the entire ESOP lifecycle. We balance the needs of owners, managers, the company and its employees to ensure long-term corporate sustainability with substantial employee ownership. As the preeminent ESOP consulting company providing services to companies in all stages of employee ownership, SES ESOP Strategies takes a uniquely strategic and responsible approach that maximizes value for owners, their companies and their employees. With guidance from our ESOP consultants and attorneys, who work for our affiliated firm, Stevens & Lee, PC, an ESOP can support a succession strategy and ownership transition that delivers sustainable benefits to all stakeholders. Our cross-disciplinary approach integrates legal, finance, banking, tax and ERISA expertise, allowing SES ESOP Strategies to deliver a full range of ESOP consulting, design, legal and financial services.

Executive Financial Services, is a trusted leader in ESOP consulting, working with business owners nationwide for over forty years. Kelly Finnell, respected speaker and author of The ESOP Coach, along with his partner, Andrew Holmes, specialize exclusively in ESOPs, making them respected advisors for business owners and financial teams year after year.

Torana Group is a novel investment firm that helps people invest in their convictions. Where others see expendable resources, we find essential value. We invest in extraordinary enterprises where essential resources - like soil, water, frontline labor - must be managed in drastically different ways, at a time when markets must work for all or risk collapse. We invest debt and equity into businesses where human and natural resources are strategic drivers of enterprise value. For business owners, we offer capital to help enterprises grow responsibly and share value in meaningful ways. For investors, we make capital work harder to create stability and resilience in our turbulent world.

Monarch Investment Partners

Chicago, IL

We believe employee ownership is a simple yet powerful idea – empowering employees to think and act like owners drives innovation, productivity, and shared prosperity. When ownership is shared, businesses thrive, communities grow, and wealth is built for generations to come. With deep and personal conviction in these benefits, Monarch Investment Partners provides the capital to make employee ownership a reality. We help businesses, advisors and investors navigate the complexities of Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) and strive to expand employee ownership by making ESOPs a viable and preferred transition or exit option for middle market business owners. With decades of expertise in employee ownership and unique financing alternatives, Monarch offers a structure where companies and employees can thrive together – thereby transforming ownership into opportunity and ensuring lasting success for all stakeholders.

Tandem Center for Shared Business Success

Lancaster, PA

Tandem is a nonprofit dedicated to helping you create and share more success. We work collaboratively with you and your professional advisors to help you utilize Profit Sharing and/or Direct Employee Ownership to achieve your goals. Tandem was founded on November 29, 2023 by Chip Cargas, Founder & Chair Emeritus of Cargas, in partnership with the Lancaster Chamber, the PA Center for Employee Ownership (PaCEO), the National Center for Employee Ownership (NCEO), and Tandem’s Board of Directors.

National Center for Employee Ownership (NCEO)

Oakland, CA

We are a nonprofit organization that has been supporting the employee ownership community since 1981. Our mission is to help employee ownership thrive. We have thousands of members because we help people make smart decisions about employee ownership, with everything from reliable information on technical issues to inspiration to help companies reach the full potential of employee ownership. We generate original research, facilitate the exchange of best practices at our live and online events, feature the best and most current writing by experts in our publications, and help employee ownership companies build ownership cultures where employees think and act like owners. Whether you are considering employee ownership, managing an existing plan, or advising clients, we can help. Our members have access to all of our online resources, and we are committed to providing extensive materials for anyone interested in learning more about employee ownership, from people considering employee ownership to decision-makers at employee-owned companies to ESOP participants to journalists to stock plan administrators and other service providers. We welcome everyone to sign up for our twice-monthly email bulletin and to visit our blog. Our staff covers the nation from multiple locations in the U.S., and our board includes representatives from employee-owned companies and the professional advisors who serve them. We are supported almost entirely through membership fees and our activities, but we do accept donations, which are tax-deductible (we are qualified as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit charitable organization).

Project Equity

Oakland, CA

Founded in 2014, we help businesses transition to employee ownership, securing liquidity and a fair sale price for the owner while helping employees build equity and a solid career path. We conduct in-depth regional data studies that analyze business and workforce numbers to help communities retain jobs and address long-standing wealth inequalities that can hold local economies back. We also work with other leaders in the field to advance policies and practices that scale employee ownership across the nation.

Common Trust

San Francisco, CA

Common Trust is a platform that equips small business owners to exit to their employees and community. Our methodology is based on the idea that owners should be able to transition their business profitably while protecting their legacy, purpose and people through a sale, ensuring both high performance and community impact for generations to come.

Lumo Group helps mission-driven companies plan for the future. Our practice includes strategic planning, succession planning, purpose trust ownership conversions, capital and financing advisory services, and leadership development. We work exclusively for clients who have a positive vision for the future, and who care about their stakeholders.

Scott Insurance is a Virginia-based insurance company and long-time proponent and participant in employee ownership. Scott Insurance offers a wide variety of products to its customers, including employee benefits, surety bonds, personal insurance, and property and casualty [LOCKED_ICON] its more traditional insurance products, Scott Insurance has also succeeded in partnering with the National Center for Employee Ownership (NCEO) to design captive insurance products for companies that have an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP). Captive insurance is a form of self-insuring that allows participants to reduce exposure to volatility in the broader insurance [LOCKED_ICON] its partnership with NCEO, Scott Insurance has created insurance programs that allow a group of companies with ESOPs to band together and self-insure by forming a new, co-owned insurance company. For employee-owned companies with strong year-over-year performance, this can help reduce the cost of insurance and take ownership of their risk management. According to NCEO, ESOP participants in captive insurance programs can reduce their annual premiums by 10% to 25%. In addition, participants can generate investment income and have claims costs returned to them in years when claims are low. Scott Insurance and NCEO currently offer health insurance, workers compensation, general liability, and automobile coverage through their captive insurance programs.‍Scott Insurance was one of the country’s first companies to adopt an ESOP in 1975, a year after the Employment Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) wrote them into law. The company is now 100% employee-owned through its ESOP, which includes over 315 employee-owners, and it actively markets the advantages of employee ownership to clients and job [LOCKED_ICON] the insurance industry, market pressures from mergers and acquisitions make it rare for a company of Scott Insurance’s size to remain independent. The company maintains its employee ownership has been integral to remaining one of the largest independent insurance agencies in the Southeast, with nine offices across Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina, and South Carolina. The company’s ownership structure — which helps tenured employees build wealth over the long-term — works hand-in-hand to align the interests of its employee-owners with providing high-quality service.

When should a business owner start succession planning?

Succession planners often recommend planning begin 5 years in advance of the anticipated exit. However, there is **no** hard rule for this, and a successful exit can occur within a year, sometimes less.

When is the best time to sell my business?

The optimal time to sell a business is when it is 1. performing strongly, 2. has a capable management team in place, and 3. the founder is prepared to transition out - ideally with a 12-month runway to execute the sale process effectively.

What is Employee Ownership (EO)?

Why haven't I heard about employee ownership before now?

Most advisors and succession planners are either unaware of EO or misunderstand it. Sometimes supporting owners to pursue other exit-paths better aligns with their incentives. However this is changing and there are many ongoing efforts to raise awareness of EO.